


The Echo Garden

by AltraViolet



Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers: Prime
Genre: AU, Blood, Crossover Pairings, Culture, Enemies to Lovers, IDW1/TFP crossover, M/M, MTMTE Rodimus/TFP Soundwave, Tentacles, crackpair but taken seriously, violence/medical stuff/etc typical of comics, world-building
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-04
Updated: 2020-12-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:08:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 49,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22553779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AltraViolet/pseuds/AltraViolet
Summary: Soundwave's banishment to the shadowzone has been bleak, uneventful andunending.He hasn't been able to contact Megatron or the Nemesis. He's low on fuel. If it weren't for the emotion-suppressing protocols he implemented before the war, he would be miserable.And then one day a dimension-hopping Rodimus falls into the shadowzone and offers him a way out.“You'll like theLost Light,”said Rodimus. “Everyone gets a second chance, there. You wanna stay here forever?”
Relationships: Rodimus/Soundwave
Comments: 559
Kudos: 687





	1. The Shadowzone

**Author's Note:**

> MTMTE Rodimus/TFP Soundwave is my crackiest crackship and it wasn't until _Lost Light_ ended that I could write it a plausibly realistic story. Like many of my crackships, I've paired them based on their colors and shapes. These two are also distinguished by their beautiful and unique designs. Even within their own continuities, where beauty and uniqueness are ubiquitous, they stand out. At least, in my eyes. Enjoy =) 
> 
> Rating will probably change.

The sun was setting for the thousand-thousandth time in the shadowzone.

Soundwave took note and called Laserbeak back. He leaned against the cliff wall, cataloging his pile of scavenged parts. It was a redundant task: he had not found new parts in months. He'd scanned this precious pile countless times, committing its broken shapes to memory. Soundwave couldn't build anything functional from them, though he had tried. 

So, in the absence of action, he had observed. The shadowzone's rules were fickle and strange. Sometimes he had found objects half in and half out, the barrier between dimensions sizzling and crackling. He'd gripped the objects and pulled as hard as he could. Sometimes they dislodged from the real world and rocketed back into his fragile fingers. Sometimes they wouldn't budge and he was forced to abandon them. Soundwave had found a correlation between the magnetic field of the Earth and the shadowzone's strength. He could walk through most walls and all living beings- mechanical or otherwise- yet would not phase through the ground. Even in places where the ground and the walls were composed of the same substance. It was a curiosity that he had ample time to ponder over, but no specialized scanners or computing equipment with which he could test his thoughts. He missed the glowing consoles of the _Nemesis._

The _Nemesis..._

Soundwave had witnessed Megatron's last battle with the Autobots. Stuck in the shadowzone, he had been useless, shooting the enemy with phantom blasts. He had seen his leader fall from the Omega Lock. Soundwave had jumped after him. He had been overwhelmed by the ionized layers of Earth's atmosphere screaming past his sensitive antennae, pelting his plating. Unlike Megatron, he did not burn as he fell. But unable to transform, he couldn't follow his leader. He had fallen. And awoken. In the sepia dust. Alone. 

Some days the silence was overwhelming. He would send Laserbeak as far as it could go, then ping its return on every frequency and map each data point in three dimensions, just for something to do.

Until energy became a problem. Soundwave had deactivated the non-essential biolights in his body, had mourned the loss of the use of his tentacles. He'd drained them of energon and coiled them up years ago. He missed them as much as he missed transforming... in as much as he could _miss_ something. The emotion-suppressing protocols he had installed before the war were still in place.

When he found the dead, he cannibalized them with no compunctions.

Laserbeak crested over the canyon wall, catching the dulled light of sunset on its wings. Soundwave prepped his torso for its docking. 

**_bweerrrrrrzzzz_ **

Soundwave cocked his head. The sound was familiar.

**_bwwfffzzzzzz_ **

Soundwave shot upright to attention, fingers twitching.

_Something_ was disturbing the hazy architecture of the shadowzone. He felt it like an earthquake through the frequencies. He sent Laserbeak a soundless order:

_find the source_

He waited, the fine sensors of his helm quivering with energy. He scanned every incoming vibration. It was unlike anything the Decepticons had, or the Autobots, or even the humans.

_aliens?_

Soundwave didn't wait for Laserbeak's return. He half-climbed, half-phased through the cliff wall until he reached the plateau above. All his plating was twitchy with rising energy. It intensified, shuddering through his biolights, making the tightly coiled tentacles inside him rattle in their housing.

_portal...?_

Green light flashed overhead.

He _knew_ it. The energy profile was very similar to the space bridges he once commanded. Laserbeak sent him a warning pulse. Soundwave should've ducked down but his frame was sizzling with so much electricity, it stripped the wariness from him. After years of dull nothingness, the prospect of the unknown spun through his processor.

The portal stretched and widened with swirling green lightning. An audial-searing sound split it open, revealing a shining expanse of energy. Dust whipped through the air. Soundwave shielded his visor with his forearms. The portal flashed again, and Soundwave could tell by the patterns of its energies that something was coming through.

“AHHHHH!”

Something fell from the portal and crashed into the ground. Dust sprang up around it, obscuring it. 

Another object, much smaller, fell out of the portal and hit the first object with a metallic _tink!_

Before Soundwave could properly register what he had observed, the energy shuddering his plating changed. It tuned to a familiar sour note. The portal darkened and sizzled and-

_no!_

-closed.

Soundwave cursed the fact that he had been here for so long and hadn't been able to collect the equipment he needed to take advantage of that portal-

Something in the dust groaned.

Laserbeak transmitted a recording, a replay of the portal opening from an aerial view. A mech-shaped thing had fallen out of it.

_mech-shaped thing_

Soundwave assessed his situation. Unless it was a _very_ competent Decepticon, he was inclined to cannibalize it. He was, however, painfully aware of his limitations. His weapons and tentacles were offline. His arms were good for defense, but his fingers were fragile and ineffective for offense. Soundwave had all his fighting skills, still, but he hadn't been able to practice them on another living being in a long time.

“-frickin' Brainstorm-”

Soundwave's helm snapped up. That was Neocybex! Or... a variant of it. It was an accent he had never heard before and that didn't match anything in his database. Laserbeak swooped down and docked.

The dust settled. Soundwave stepped closer. He was not afraid.

He was never afraid.

It was a Cybertronian, albeit the strangest one Soundwave had ever seen. It lay on the ground, back to him. It was red and gold and had a spoiler and wheels. Its proportions were _bizarre_. But the strangest thing was that its biolights were red, and there was _pink_ dripping from the wounds it had sustained in its fall, and its field was expressed like shifting, nebulous clouds instead of the usual pulses- 

“-swear I'm gonna lose it if this is another dimension where everything is made of anti-matter sharks-”

Soundwave double-checked the wordage of the sentence. It was so strange, he thought at first it might be in code.

Finally, the thing raised itself up from the ground enough to turn around and-

It was an Autobot. An Autobrand was emblazoned on its flame-shaped yellow chest. 

And it had a _nose_. Just like the humans did.

Soundwave assumed a defensive stance. 

The Autobot pushed itself up unsteadily to its knees, and then its feet. It teetered, shaking its head.

Soundwave prepared to siphon Laserbeak's energy away to power up a tentacle. He would've struck immediately, but cataloging the Autobot's strange field, blood, and features had distracted him.

“Hey!” The Autobot smiled up at him.

Oh, it definitely must be an alien, to smile at _him_.

“Hey, where is this place? Can you tell me what dimension this is?” The Autobot strode over.

Soundwave raised his hand. The Autobot stopped.

“Whoa. You are _creepy._ You're Cybertronian, aren't you? Can you understand me?”

Soundwave watched the way the plating of its body moved. So many interlocking pieces, instead of the long, smooth panels he was used to. He had never seen _anything_ like it. Not even in the humans' creations; their television fantasies spun through his sensors occasionally. They hadn't dredged up anything like this.

“Hello?”

After another moment of calculated silence, Soundwave nodded.

“So you _can_ understand me. Excellent. Where are we? Is this Earth? It looks kinda Earthy.”

Soundwave nodded again. He initiated the energy transfer from Laserbeak. The little drone whined quietly, powering down against his chest. He didn't like to do it, but in a moment, they would both have all the energon they needed.

Energy flowed down the length of one of his coiled tentacles. Only one, that's all he could afford to activate. 

The Autobot chattered as it neared, meaningless words that Soundwave recorded in case he could use them later. Suddenly, it stopped.

“Oh,” it said. “You're a Decepticon.”

The tentacle was almost fully operational. Soundwave sent a quick activation command to it. As it stirred, Laserbeak went still.

“Well, that's alright. The war's been over for ages, you know.”

What kind of diversionary tactic was that?! Soundwave had heard more dignified lies from Starscream. Which was saying a lot.

“What's your name? I'm Rodimus.” The Autobot bowed with a flourish. “Proud inter-dimensional adventurer and co-captain of the _Lost Light!”_

Soundwave sampled Rodimus's voice and repeated it back to him. Twisted. “In-in-inTER-dimens- _ens_ -sional.” 

Rodimus startled at that. “Yeah,” he said uncertainly. “There are a lot of dimensions. Looks like I've stumbled into yours.”

Soundwave picked one of Rodimus's words and looped it. “Lost lostlost l-lllllost **lost** lost l-”

_“Okay,_ I get it,” Rodimus said. He stooped and picked something up from the ground. “I don't suppose you're some kind of evil, Decepticon Bumblebee? Nine out of ten Bumblebees lose their vocalizers and loop sound when they're being annoying.”

Soundwave bristled.

“Whoa!” Rodimus stepped back. “What a field flare. Guess you didn't like tha-”

Soundwave shot his tentacle out at Rodimus. For a moment, the sight of its biolights made Soundwave feel like he was his old self again. Before Rodimus could react, Soundwave looped it around him tightly, aiming its tip at the juncture of his knee, where energon leaked through. Soundwave unleashed its smaller, flexible tendrils and dug them into the wound.

“OW! What the hell!” Rodimus struggled against him. The Autobot was more than a full head shorter, but quite a bit more stocky. In a very strange and angled way that Soundwave was unaccustomed to. His tentacle pinched in the sharp corners of the Autobot's flame-shaped chest.

The little tendrils dug around. They channeled the energon back to Soundwave's body, where his line filters promptly sent a gigantic screaming **NO** to his processor. Just as the tendrils started to burn and pain flared down the tentacle, Rodimus wrenched his arms apart and freed himself.

Soundwave stumbled back, anti-poison protocols activating. The tentacle flailed pathetically.

_what is that substance_

_not energon_

_pain_

“That's fuckin' creepy!” shouted Rodimus. “I come in peace, goddammit!” He reared back and punched Soundwave in the face.

~~

_**Initializing reboot protocols.**  
**Warning:** energy levels at 13%  
**Warning:** Autobot in proximity  
**Warning:** Laserbeak offline  
**Warning:** restraints detected  
**Warning:** unable to contact Megatron  
**Warning:** unable to locate the _Nemesis _  
**Warning:** unable to connect to geosynchronous satellites  
**Warning:** location unknown  
**Warning:** emotion-suppression protocols 1 - 14 fail-_

Soundwave cut off the deluge of warnings filling his processor. After the first four, they were repeats. He had seen them every day since he had been forced into the shadowzone. As the warnings faded, latticework structures materialized from the darkness. 

Soundwave had had this dream several times since coming to the shadowzone. 

The structures were made of stars connected by thin lines, pure and vibrant, as if from a spool of thread made from his spark. They towered like constellations over the landscape of his processor. They vibrated like plucked strings, each note filling the space between the stars with... _data..._

_data he couldn't define..._

The only thing he understood about this dream was that the structures and the sounds they produced were linked. Not just linked, they were one and the same. They were visual and auditory representations of data in his processor, flowing together and coming apart again. Their mixing produced a third type of data that he couldn't define. It manifested itself viscerally as something like a field pulse, hovering between the latticework. 

Soundwave knew that because he couldn't grasp that third data set, he was unable to piece together the object before him properly. It was like trying to transform without a T cog. If he could just decode that nebulous data, everything would fall into place. The stars before him brightened, their sounds growing louder, urging him to solve the puzzle. Soundwave's processor ached. 

His reboot protocols finished. The constellations and their song and their fields vanished, and Soundwave felt the weight of his frame and the ground beneath him pull him back to the waking world.

Soundwave stirred, onlining his visor, the dream forgotten. He sent pings to his frame, assessing his position.

He was sitting, wrapped up in his own offline tentacle, propped against a wall. Annoyance flickered through him and he sent a command to Laserbeak. The little drone was silent, dead against his chest.

He forced himself to take another moment and evaluate.

“Oh? You awake now?”

The Autobot sauntered up, something of a smirk on his face, holding a device. The device was emitting signals. Soundwave focused on it. Just like the Autobot's Neocybex, it had an accent of sorts. Not a code to decrypt, but enough of a different flavor to it that he had to concentrate to understand. His visor displayed data and spinning reticles as he evaluated its output.

“You know, back in the old days, I would've punched more than once,” said Rodimus. “But things are different now.”

Soundwave ignored Rodimus, concentrating on the device.

“If you were hungry, you could've just said so. I have a supply of energon. You don't have to suck it out of me like a _vampire.”_

Soundwave recognized the Earth word. But he dismissed it just as quickly, as he'd worked out what the device was.

A _beacon_.

A way out of the shadowzone.

As Rodimus neared, Soundwave seriously considered the new options before him. Destroy the Autobot and take the beacon? Feign alliance and follow the Autobot out of the shadowzone and _then_ destroy him?

“As far as I can tell, we're in a... pocket? Universe?” Rodimus squinted at his device. “Something like that? It's the Earth for this dimension, but it's not quite right.” He gestured to Soundwave's precious pile of scavenged parts. “And I take it, by your hunger and these scraps, that you've been stuck here for a long time. You didn't intend to be here.”

“E- _earth._ P-pocket. Un- _universe,”_ Soundwave confirmed, with Rodimus's voice. “St- _stuck_ here for a- for a- l- **long** _time.”_

“Ah, finally. Some useful information.” Rodimus poked at the device again, then sat down. He remained a healthy distance from Soundwave. He set the beacon on the ground next to him. “Let me guess. You're Soundwave?”

The faintest, tiniest wave of surprise washed through Soundwave. _“Soundwave,”_ he repeated.

“Thought so. You've got that weird echo-y, rainbow-y thing going on with your vocalizer. What's up with that, anyway? Our Soundwave had it, too.”

_had it,_ noted Soundwave. _past tense_

“You look so _weird,_ though. No offense.”

“Y- _you_ look so-SO- _**weird.”**_ Soundwave didn't repeat the “no offense.”

Rodimus snorted. “So, can you talk? Or just repeat things? How did you get here? What is this place?”

Soundwave considered the questions. Then he simply repeated, _“hunger.”_

“Hah. If I give you fuel, can I trust you won't attack?”

“T-trust.” Soundwave flashed a smilie face up on his visor. “Won't _won't_ at- **tack?”**

Rodimus laughed. He pulled something from what Soundwave assumed was his subspace compartment. “Here. I'm guessing, since you're so different-looking, the energon your frame works with is also different from mine. This is the purest grade energon Brainstorm is able to make. We've run into a few other-dimensioners who can't ingest what we have on tap.”

Soundwave, still tied up in his own tentacle, stared.

“What? I figured you could at least unwind yourself.”

Soundwave displayed his fuel gauge.

“Oh.” Rodimus set the energon down and slowly unwound Soundwave. “This thing is freaky. It's cold, too. You conserving resources? Damn, look at all these dead biolights...”

Soundwave twitched, loathing the touch of the Autobot. When at last he was freed, he manually wound up his tentacle and stored it in his torso, the tip hanging out. Rodimus made a face at that. Soundwave ignored him. He took the energon and scanned it with his limited capabilities.

Not promising.

He extracted the thin tips from his tentacle with his fingers. He placed them in the energon. They twitched and jerked, shunting it to his main lines, faintly relighting the biolights.

His line filters sent him unhappy feedback. 

It was edible, but it wasn't going to feel nice.

Soundwave took in just enough of it to relight all his biolights and restore Laserbeak to half power. Then he handed it back to Rodimus.

“Too- _too_. Diff **ere** nt,” he said, sampling Rodimus's words and placing them together. “N-n- _not._ Pure.” 

“Hmm. Too bad.” Rodimus knocked the container back and drank the rest. “Come back to the _Lost Light_ with me. We have the equipment there to make what you need. Probably.”

Soundwave glanced around. The sun had set. The night sky was brown, dull as rust, starless. He had considered returning with the Autobot, if only to get out of the shadowzone. But what dimension would he be led to? Would he be able to resume his loyal work to the Decepticon cause?

“You'll like the _Lost Light_. Everyone gets a second chance, there. You wanna stay here forever?”

Soundwave's antennae twitched.

“It's got Megatron as co-captain.”

_megatron_

Soundwave straightened.

_megatron!_

He displayed a video of Megatron saying, “excellent!”

Rodimus stared into his visor. “Holy moly. Is that your Megatron?”

_“Megatron,”_ Soundwave repeated.

“Hah. Ol' Megs is gonna love to see that one. I swear, every dimension we go to, he's got crazier eyes than the last.”

Something approaching emotions flooded through Soundwave. Megatron was alive! And... with Autobots? Commanding their ship? No, that couldn't be right. His years of dullness and hunger must be clouding his logic circuits. He analyzed the conversation.

This wouldn't be _his_ Megatron. He had witnessed his Megatron fall in battle, unable to reach out, unable to shoot, unable to help.

This would be the _Autobot's_ Megatron.

But...

All Megatrons would have started the war. Would be proud Decepticons. That the one called Rodimus wore the Autobadge at all was proof of a war in his dimension.

Soundwave could not conceive of a situation wherein Megatron would ally himself with the Autobots. Unless... unless he was lying in wait. _That_ Megatron had lost his Soundwave. And had been surrounded by Autobots. He must be biding his time, _pretending_ to be an Autobot, until his true allies returned to him.

Soundwave was suddenly a lot more interested in the _Lost Light_.

_“Lost Light,”_ he replayed.

“Cool.” Rodimus laid back with his hands behind his head. “Time might be kinda funny between dimensions. They'll come get me in a couple hours their time. But I dunno how long it'll feel like in here. Maybe a few days.”

Soundwave said nothing.

“So, where's Ravage?”

Soundwave displayed a huge question mark on his visor. “R- **rav** age?” he repeated.

“Yeah. You know. Black cat. Cassetticon. Where are your cassetticons?” Rodimus squinted at him. “Or do you not turn into a radio-type thing? That'll be a first. All Soundwaves do.”

Soundwave did not understand a word of what Rodimus was saying. It irritated him. He manually overrode the hopeful pings from his weapons systems.

_patience_

“N-not turn into _into_ r-radio-type thing,” Soundwave repeated. He flashed up a video of Starscream shouting, “Laserbeak!” and pointed to his chest.

Rodimus gaped. “What the hell? _That's_ Laserbeak?”

Soundwave pointed again.

“She's... where _is_ she?”

Soundwave wondered how even an Autobot could be so stupid. He was as annoyed as he could possibly get, his processor straining with the taxing emotion. He overrode his weapons systems again and rebooted his emotion-suppressing protocols.

_patience_

_win trust_

_then destroy_

“Laserbeak,” Soundwave repeated. The drone disengaged from his chest and hovered, its red sights settling between Rodimus's eyes.

Rodimus squinted. “Six wings? Why's she got six wings?”

Soundwave spliced a recording of Shockwave. “Autobots. Illogical.”

“Yeah, whatever.” Rodimus shrugged. “Bet that's your Shockwave. Good ol' one eye. He a cyclops here, too?”

Laserbeak returned to Soundwave's chest. Soundwave played a Shockwave quote, something the scientist had said to Starscream. It had been one of the more enjoyable conversations Soundwave had been party to. “You just like to hear yourself talk.”

“Got that right,” said Rodimus lazily.

Soundwave's fingers twitched. He turned his back to Rodimus. He wanted to shoot the Autobot so badly. 

_patience_

He directed his intense focus on the data he had taken from the beacon. It would give him an introduction to the type of software he was sure to encounter on the _Lost Light._ Once he was free of the shadowzone, Soundwave would crush this Autobot, take his ship, and return to Earth to retrieve whatever remained of Megatron.


	2. The Most Recents Club

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am FLOORED at the reception to this fic. Thank you!! I thought only 2 people were going to read it. I hope to live up to your expectations <3

Once the _Lost Light_ had locked onto the beacon, Rodimus had followed Ratchet's standard operating procedure for new arrivals. It was one of the few Official Things he took seriously. Every new mech who had made the trans-dimensional jump to the _Lost Light_ had gotten sick. Rodimus radioed all the necessary details of Soundwave's status, as well as a few choice unnecessary ones.

Every new crew member aboard the _Lost Light_ was given a physical evaluation and scanned for damage. Somatic energon samples were sent to Brainstorm and Perceptor so that customized fuel could be synthesized. Ratchet had developed the procedure after observing the condition of their first pick up. The procedure evolved when the next two had also arrived dangerously low on fuel. They were all the abandoned: mechs who had been forgotten and forced to wait too long for reinforcements in their native dimensions. 

Soundwave proved to be no exception. Upon arrival, he promptly succumbed to TD3 (Trans-Dimensional Disorientation Disease, or “the sideways molecules are fuckin' you up,” as Whirl liked to call it) and was quarantined by all four medics on board.

Rodimus's primary task now, after being cleared and sprayed with disinfectant (a sticking point Minimus would _not_ back down from), was summoning the Most Recents Club. That was the super creative name he had given to the three mechs they'd picked up so far. They had a perspective on the _Lost Light_ that no one else had. Rodimus liked to ask them, based on their own experiences, what they thought the newest mech would need. Although this time Rodimus suspected the conversation would go differently than it had in the past.

They'd stopped by the med bay to take turns gawking at Soundwave through the window. And now, assembled in his office, were Trailbreaker (dimension 0203's Trailbreaker hadn't had the faintest clue why everyone called him Trailcutter at first) and Ambulon and Mirage. Rodimus felt a swell of pride followed by a tinge of sadness whenever he saw them. He'd privately challenged himself to find duplicates of every crew member who'd been lost. Whenever the _Lost Light_ jumped to a new dimension, Rodimus would sneak out and do a few hops around its Earth or Cybertron. He was still on the lookout for a Pipes, Tripodecta, Hyperion, Polaris, Shock, Ore, Ravage, Skids... There were so many more mechs to find! But these were the three he'd found so far. The others would come in time. No one could replace the originals, but it helped knowing that the newcomers had _wanted_ to come aboard. And they had, with various degrees of success, integrated and made friends.

“-viscous blue-purple energon, which is unique among all the dimensions we've visited so far, and has a _very_ unusual arrangement of parts,” Ambulon was saying. “Soundwave has the big three: spark, brain, T cog. He's definitely Cybertronian. But his biolights and his line systems...” Ambulon shook his head. “The rest of the medical team has some _compunctions_ about doing scans without getting permission and while the patient is unconscious, but I don't.” He scratched his arm. White flaked off, revealing purple beneath. Flaky paint syndrome transcended universes. “He's offline, but his processor is active. I'm pretty sure he knew what I was doing. He didn't try to stop me.”

“He's a spy,” said Mirage firmly. His plating was adorned with golden symbols and elegantly inlaid gems. This Mirage had evidently been very fashionable. Though he had expressed gratitude and excitement at being rescued, the moment he had stepped aboard the _Lost Light_ , his field had taken on an angry tinge that never went away. Rodimus had _never_ seen him smile since. “Data gathering was his function during his war.”

“How do you know that?” asked Trailbreaker. He was in all respects identical to the _Lost Light_ 's original, save his optics were bright green instead of yellow and he was missing part of his left hand. Rodimus got a lot of comfort standing by the mech. Trailbreakers just radiated good-naturedness.

“I can _tell.”_ Mirage gestured vaguely. “He's faceless, highly modified for communications. An extremely adept and dangerous individual. Data interception, infiltration, mimicry, et cetera. Just like our Soundwave.” He motioned to Rodimus. “And yours as well, I believe?”

“Uh.” Rodimus thought back. Sometimes his native dimension felt like a lifetime ago. “Yeah, I think so.” 

“He may even be able to amplify his power by infiltrating-”

The door beeped. 

“Enter,” said Rodimus.

Megatron strode in. Mirage bristled. He was the newest crew member, still not used to seeing a Megatron in command of Autobots- and wearing the Autobrand at that. Mirage covered his bristling body language with a polite cough and stepped back silently.

Rodimus didn't blame him for it, and he didn't think Megatron did, either.

Mirage would understand, in time. Just as the rest had.

“-very unusual,” Megatron was saying. “Has Brainstorm started generating rations for him?”

“Yep,” said Rodimus. “First thing I did when I got on the ship. Told him he'd need to get that energon maker thingy going.”

“I believe your very first communication upon returning was to _me_. A message that you'd found, and I quote, _a crazier-eyed Megatron than ever,_ end quote,” said Megatron.

Trailbreaker snickered. Ambulon gave a half smile. Mirage sneered.

Rodimus grinned. “Okay. _Second_ thing I did when I got on the ship. Brainstorm's on it.”

~~

Mirage lingered after the Most Recents Club disbanded. His expression became slightly less sour as the door slid shut behind Megatron. Mirage approached Rodimus, crossing one arm over his chest. Rodimus didn't know what that gesture meant. Mirage seemed to do it unconsciously and if Rodimus mimicked the pose he got very annoyed. 

Rodimus slapped a smile on his face he didn't really feel. “What's up, Mirage? Got some secret spy intel on Soundwave?”

“No. This is an unrelated matter.” Mirage's biolights flickered. In Rodimus's dimension, they would be read as _boredom._ Rodimus suspected that wasn't what Mirage actually felt. Mirage hadn't adopted the biolight signals most of the crew employed. Maybe he couldn't. “I wish to return home.”

Rodimus frowned. “I'm sorry, Mirage. You know we can't do that.”

“There must be a way!”

Rodimus sighed. “If there was a way, I'd let you go back. You know that, right?”

Mirage made an uncharacteristically undignified whimper. He reset his vocalizer. “I'm not happy here.”

Rodimus felt that like a knife in his spark. His shoulders slumped. “I'm sorry,” he said. “Is it because of Megatron?”

The gold of Mirage's eyes intensified. “ _No._ Although I am not a fan, obviously.”

“What is it? Do you want to switch jobs? Our Mirage founded _Visages._ I'm sure Bluestreak would be happy to have you-”

“It's not that,” spat Mirage. “You wouldn't understand.”

“Try me,” said Rodimus, spreading his arms. “I've _seen things._ I can't imagine you telling me anything that'll shock me.”

Mirage glared at him.

“Well?”

“If we ever find a way to go back, I wish to go back.”

“Okay,” said Rodimus. “I promise we'll let you go. But we won't know how much time will have passed in your dimension. We don't know what you'll find if you go back. We don't know what it'll do to _you.”_

“I understand. I shall accept every consequence.” Mirage nodded curtly. “Captain.” He left, his footsteps soundless.

Rodimus semi-transformed his limbs, shaking them to let the tenseness out of his lines. He didn't expect everyone on the ship to be happy all the time, or to give him their undying love, as much as he half-ironically felt he deserved it. But seeing a newcomer so unhappy did something to his insides. Rodimus shifted from foot to foot. “It's alright,” he muttered to himself. “We'll figure it out. We'll find something for him.” 

Rodimus took a deep breath, pushed Mirage out of his mind, and headed for the bridge.

~~

The latticework sang and wove its mysterious data. Soundwave's processor ached. Though he knew he was dreaming, he could feel his body. As an aerial mech, he was used to feeling light, thin, fast. But now his frame felt heavy and sick. Soundwave initiated an evaluation. The dream interfered and terminated his command. All Soundwave could do was push futilely against the data clouding his mind.

Far on the horizon of his processor something pierced the star-laden darkness. Soundwave focused on it with laser-like precision. Even with the data accent, its energy pattern was instantly recognizable.

_medical probe_

He was being evaluated! The Autobots were more foolish than he could have hoped. He could tell at a glance that the probe was harmless. Soundwave allowed it to spread and poke at his processor. It would not find anything of note. 

Soundwave, however, was _not_ harmless. He redoubled his efforts to push the dream away and was rewarded by the fading of its stars. Soundwave descended upon the medical probe and traced it backwards. In a moment he was pushing his way into a medical database. He sent probes of his own, diverging and forking microprograms that stripped data indiscriminately. Names, images, and medical histories were laid bare to him. Just as he wormed his way into the system housing the database, which he suspected belonged to the _Lost Light_ itself, the medical scan ended. His microprograms dispersed and his focus was shunted back to his own processor. Soundwave quarantined his new data and onlined his visor. 

His frame sent his processor a wide range of alerts. Soundwave felt weak and off-balance. But he had no time to dwell on the sensations of his body. Sensory data flooded his mind. Everything around him was intensely _alive._ Soundwave groggily took in a pale green medical bay. Monitors floated above him, beeping and flashing data. Four Autobot medics were gathered around him, varying levels of wariness in their faces and fields. Behind them were cabinets and tables laden with equipment: clear vats of bubbling metal and shards of glass and crystal. The green walls emitted an unusual energy he had never encountered before. It manifested on his visor as a waveform graph, reticles centering around its peaks and valleys as he struggled to grasp it. 

One of the medics leaned closer, tilting her head.

Soundwave realized he was thinking aloud. He blanked the visor, making a note to evaluate incoming data _internally._ While in the shadowzone, he had gotten used to displaying whatever he liked, because no one could see him. He should have known better than to give the Autobots any indication of his thoughts. 

Soundwave's processor pulsed with the energy of the walls and the equipment and the growing attention of the medics and the beeping monitors and the comms whispering through the airwaves and the-

Soundwave ran his _Nemesis_ filter protocols- programs that automatically filtered out unnecessary noise and distraction. It had been essential for living on a ship filled with unstable personalities and droning, simpering grunts.

The room distilled into a manageable shape and Soundwave felt more grounded. He tilted his visor, studying the medics. Three were red and white, one was blue. They were like Rodimus- strange and blocky and thick, their fields hovering in the air, their speech accented. The biolight fluid running through their frames made the sound of a thousand tiny points of light. Soundwave modified his filters to strain it out.

Soundwave's plating prickled and he glanced down. He was bound to a medical berth far too small for him. His feet hung off the edge. His arms were too long for the built-in metal restraints, so his limbs had been criss-crossed by straps of hard light shielding. The position was uncomfortable, not helped at all by the disorientation his frame was constantly pinging to his processor. Soundwave's fingers curled. He struggled against the restraints. Laserbeak's wingtips scraped against the hard light. The smell of burning paint filled the room.

“Soundwave, stop!” The red and white with the permanent expression of displeasure pushed down on Soundwave's shoulders. “If you damage yourself, we are unable to repair you.”

“Not exactly the best introduction,” muttered the red and white with a face plate.

The first medic scowled. “I'm Ratchet. You're aboard the _Lost Light._ If you feel disoriented, that's a normal side effect of the trans-dimensional jump. The feeling will pass. _Stop_ struggling!”

Laserbeak pinged Soundwave. Its wingtips were singeing in the hard light shielding. Soundwave stopped moving at once.

“Good,” said Ratchet. He stared intently into Soundwave's visor. Soundwave stared back. Ratchet slowly removed his hands and gestured to the monitors. “Look at these readouts. We've never seen systems like this before. Soundwave is no ordinary Cybertronian, inside or out.”

Soundwave's body shook slightly at the familiar line. The medics stared at him. His visor flickered, displaying a clip of a red and white Cybertronian. To them he was undoubtably a medic, undoubtably an Autobot, but a stranger nontheless. This medic's properly noseless expression was one of anger and wariness. _“Soundwave is no ordinary Cybertronian, inside or out!”_

The medics gaped at Soundwave. Finally, the red and white with a faceplate said, “I think that's _his_ dimension's Ratchet.”

“Yeah,” said the blue one. “Same grumpy tone and everything.”

Ratchet made an unamused noise. “I need to bring these findings to the attention of our captains. Every dimension's Soundwave is...” He narrowed his eyes. “A formidable mech.”

Soundwave flashed a smilie face up on his visor.

The blue medic giggled.

“He'll remain here until further notice,” snapped Ratchet. “No visitors.”

“Ratchet,” said the blue medic. “You kicked me out of here for his quarantine procedures. But he's fine. Move him to one of the regular berths.”

“No, Velocity, he needs to be restrained-”

“I need to get back to work! Swerve just brought me a new alloy to try-”

“You let _Swerve_ in here?!”

Velocity's field swelled with exasperation. “Yes! You already gave him clearance!”

Ratchet and Velocity launched into a heated argument. Soundwave endured exactly 47 seconds of it. He played a sample of Rodimus's voice. _“Megatron.”_

Velocity froze, her finger pointed in Ratchet's face. All four medics turned to him, heads swiveling in unison.

“One of those Soundwave tricks,” said the flaky medic. He squinted at Soundwave. There was purple paint beneath his white. 

“Makes you wonder, doesn't it,” said the red and white with a face plate. “A Soundwave and a Megatron on the same ship. That's probably bad luck.”

 _“Megatron,”_ repeated Rodimus's voice.

“There's no such thing as bad luck,” said Velocity, lowering her accusatory finger. “I've alerted Ultra Magnus that we've finished. Soundwave needs to go somewhere else. Swerve, Anode, and I have experiments to do!”

**_“Megatron.”_ **

_“Fine,”_ said Ratchet, slamming his palm down on a button. The medical berth's restraints flickered off. “Why bother taking precautions with one of the most dangerous Decepticons in every dimension?”

“That's not what I sai-”

“If he wants to see Megatron so badly, I'll get someone from the Security Team to escort us to the bridge.” Ratchet punched a few more buttons. “For the duration of our trip, I highly suggest you comply with all orders, Soundwave. The Security Team can be... twitchy.”

Soundwave awkwardly pushed himself up from the medical berth. His frame was unsteady, sending variegated feedback to his processor. He sent out a recalibration command: his plating shifted and twitched. He caught little flashes of fear in the Autobot's fields as he towered over them. 

“Come on,” snapped Ratchet, leading the way to the door. Soundwave followed. The remaining medics stepped aside for him.

An Autobot waited for them in the hallway. He had a huge gun, three lights on his helm, and the least subtle paint job Soundwave had ever seen on a mech. He stepped back slightly as Soundwave approached, then squared his shoulders and shifted the plating of his chest so it looked bigger.

Just as the door slid shut, the faceplated medic said, “shoot, we forgot to give him the introductory primer-”

~~

Soundwave distracted himself from the sickening feeling in his frame by discretely scanning the walls of the _Lost Light._ He generated a map, adding information to it in navigable layers. Soundwave flicked his noise filters on and off, grabbing little bits of data until it threatened to disorient him. Aquafend, the security officer, prodded him with his gun when he slowed. Soundwave swung his arms away from the mech, privately planning how he would dismember the Autobot as soon as he had the chance.

Ratchet led them through a surprisingly long, circuitous route. The ship was much bigger than the _Nemesis_ had been. It rang with that energy Soundwave could not define, something that crawled through the walls themselves. The _Lost Light_ wasn't alive... but it was quite lively for something inanimate.

At last they reached the heavy door to the bridge. Aquafend tilted his gun up and aimed it at Soundwave's head. “One wrong move and I'll be happy to separate your processor from the rest of ya. If you _have_ a processor behind that mask, Decepticon.”

Soundwave gave Aquafend nothing but chilly silence. Ratchet rolled his eyes and activated the door. Soundwave followed him in, ducking slightly under the doorway.

“Hey, Ratchet!” Rodimus bounded over from his chair. “At ease, Aquafend. Soundwave's not a prisoner here.” Aquafend didn't lower his gun. “Ratchet, did you notice his voice is busted? Maybe you can fix it-”

Soundwave turned away from them and did a sweep of the room. It had the typical components of a starship bridge: a large screen, stations, monitors, consoles. There were about a dozen colorful mechs strewn around. They were all strangers to him, save one. He identified Megatron right away. Even with the Autobrand and tank treads, he was the most commanding, _powerful_ figure on the bridge. A solid, blocky gray. Soundwave walked to him, preparing his unused vocalizer, overriding the protocol for his vow of silence. He could not think of a single thing that would give him more pleasure to utter than that which he had wished to say for years. As he neared, Megatron stood from his captain's chair, frowning. His field, alien as it was, was unmistakably _Megatron._

With a slight bow, Soundwave asked in his own true, cascading voice, “Lord Megatron, what is your command?”

The entire bridge went silent. Every mech stopped what they were doing, swiveled, and stared at him. Megatron looked faintly horrified.

Rodimus's jaw dropped. “You lying bastard! I thought you couldn't talk!”

Soundwave flashed the Decepticon brand across his visor for just an instant, confident Megatron would see it and the Autobots would not.

“It... has been a long time since I've been addressed in such a manner,” said Megatron slowly. His voice was more sonorous than Soundwave's Megatron's had been. Less intimidating, but more compelling. “Soundwave, while aboard this ship, you will address me as your captain. Or co-captain.”

_captain?_

Soundwave's processor raced.

_the ruse. he must stay in character._

Soundwave's visor displayed undulating red wire frames. “Yes, captain.”

“That's better.” Megatron looked him up and down. “I think we should continue this conversation in private.”

“Affirmative.” Soundwave followed him out, eager for their conversation.


	3. Listen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> .:Comm speak:.

The walk to Megatron's quarters was long. Soundwave mapped the way, noting the lights and ventilation grates in the hallways. He charted the underlying structures of the ship. Its systems were _mostly_ orderly. Parts of the ship had taken heavy damage in the past. At the junctions of old and new metal, Soundwave sensed the electrical system behind the walls had been fixed with hasty patches.

Megatron said nothing. He walked methodically. He glanced at Soundwave, his field pulled in tightly. 

The halls were lively with strolling, chatting mechs. As they approached, their animated conversations quieted. They looked from Soundwave's Decepticon sigils to Megatron and back again. Only after they had passed did their conversations resume, in whispers. 

The door to Megatron's quarters was freshly painted. The smell churned Soundwave's insides. The disorientation of his dimensional crossing still hadn't faded. Megatron paused at the door. He brushed the Autobrand on his chest. He took a deep breath and entered his key code. The door slid open.

Megatron's quarters were sparsely furnished. There was a berth and a desk with data pads on it. Megatron sat down heavily on the bed. The readout on its recharge station indicated he was due for rest. Megatron crossed one leg over the other and folded his hands on his knee. He studied Soundwave. 

Soundwave waited. 

At last, Megatron said, “do you have Ravage with you?”

_a second inquiry. why do they ask me for Ravage?_

“Negative,” said Soundwave. “Ravage does not exist in my dimension.” He pointed to his chest. “Laserbeak.”

“Ah, Laserbeak.” Megatron squinted at Soundwave, following the intricacies of his plating and biolights. He tilted his head and frowned, unable to tell where Soundwave ended and Laserbeak began. “Show me.”

Soundwave leaned back slightly. Laserbeak undocked from his chest and hovered between them.

“Ah.” Megatron sat up a little straighter. “She is formidable.”

“It is not sentient,” said Soundwave.

“'It,'” repeated Megatron. He stared past Laserbeak, at Soundwave's bare chest.

“Laserbeak is important,” said Soundwave. He signaled the drone to return to its place. “But not sentient.” 

Megatron said nothing.

Soundwave waited.

Megatron's frown grew deeper.

Finally, he said, “Soundwave, you are, without a doubt, very capable and extremely loyal.”

On his visor, Soundwave displayed a video of his Megatron saying, _“excellent work, Soundwave!”_

Megatron's eyes widened. “By Primus,” he said. “Is that your Megatron?”

“Affirmative. Lord Megatron.”

“Where is he now?”

“Unknown. He fell to Earth from the _Nemesis.”_

“I see.” Megatron tapped his chin. “No doubt he survived that fall.” 

“I could not find him. I was trapped in the shadowzone.” Soundwave displayed a cascade of data describing the zone. It was faster than explaining its properties using words.

Megatron read the cascade. “Such isolation.” He stood and strode back and forth in his quarters. Soundwave watched, head turning as he went. “Soundwave, I have something very important to share with you.”

Soundwave nodded. 

_the spy directive_

“I think you will find it difficult to hear, but it is true.” Megatron stopped his pacing and stared straight at him. “The war is over. Not just in my dimension, but in almost every dimension we've ever hopped to. And we have been to _many._ In every dimension where the war has ended, it ends with the Autobots as victors.”

Soundwave's visor went red.

“I've not felt a field like that before,” said Megatron softly. He steepled his fingers before him. “Your anger is understandable, but ultimately, displaced. I am certain that with enough time, your Megatron would have either lost the war or been terminated, thus concluding it. That is the constant we see, time and time again, across the dimensions.”

Disbelief and anger pulsed through Soundwave. His biolights went deep purple. Soundwave spared a moment to note the emotional outburst. He ran his emotion-suppressing protocols. _“How_ is this possible? Decepticons: superior. Autobots: _inferior.”_

“Because there's more to life than conquest and destruction. I have discovered that all life has inherent worth.”

“All life: worthy of conquering.”

Megatron shook his head. “Destruction and extinction are unsustainable.”

“Extinction of unwanted species: desirable.”

“Happiness is not found in the barrel of a gun.”

“Happiness: irrelevant.”

Megatron sighed. “And therein lies the crux.” He paced. “Soundwave, while aboard this ship, you are not to harm any others, take any lives, or infiltrate any of the ship's systems. And you _will_ follow orders if given them.”

“Soundwave: does not take orders from Autobots.”

“But you will take orders from me.”

Soundwave took a moment to digest that statement. His visor displayed a picture of Megatron's chest. A red reticle spun around the Autobrand. 

“You _will_ take orders from me,” repeated Megatron.

Soundwave's processor felt on the brink of crashing. His biolights were thick with illness and his lines were tense. His display had been Megatron's opening for a knowing wink or a code word of some sort. Soundwave had directly addressed the issue hovering between them. But Megatron was just staring, his face unreadable beyond _stern_.

Soundwave refocused with laser precision, very carefully going over each word.

_“Soundwave: does not take orders from Autobots.”_

_“But you will take orders from me.”_

_**does not take orders from Autobots, but from me** _

The denial of being an Autobot was there. It had been _so_ subtle. Surely Megatron could speak freely in his own private quarters? Soundwave was certain that Megatron's room wouldn't be bugged, but he hadn't scanned it, out of deference to his leader. He was also certain that this was a coded conversation. The notion that _every_ war had ended with an Autobot victory was both statistically unlikely and too preposterous to consider. Soundwave was familiar with double-meaninged conversations. Starscream had been a good teacher in that regard. Megatron's field was different than his, but Soundwave could still sense it. It flared out at specific points in the conversation. Starscream's would do that, too, when he said one thing but truly meant another.

“Soundwave?”

Soundwave evaluated their conversation again, searching for an acknowledgment of their shared directive.

_“Soundwave, you are, without a doubt, very capable and extremely loyal.”_

Of course! And that statement had been accompanied by a strong field flare. Megatron was asking for the _one_ thing he knew Soundwave embodied more than any other Decepticon: loyalty. The tension in Soundwave's lines eased. This Megatron was indeed very clever. Megatron was asking for loyalty. Soundwave would give it.

“Affirmative. I will follow all of your commands.” 

Megatron pinched the bridge of his nose. Soundwave focused on the action. It was one he had never seen his Megatron do. Perhaps it was a signal.

“I encourage you to speak to the mechs that live aboard this ship. Learn who they are, what they do. Why they're here. _Listen_ to them. Their collective voices embody the mission of the _Lost Light.”_

_information gathering_

“Affirmative.”

Megatron sighed. “Go see Drift. Talk to him. He used to be a Decepticon. You need someone you can communicate with on the same level. He'll help you understand.”

“Affirmative.” 

“And Soundwave?”

Soundwave waited.

“The Decepticon movement is dissolved. It _does not exist._ I am stating this in the plainest words I can. Do you understand?” Megatron pinched the bridge of his nose again. 

_the signal!_

“Affirmative.”

Megatron brushed his chest. “Dismissed.”

Soundwave nodded and exited, replaying the conversation in his head. This Megatron was far more deliberate than his Megatron had been. He'd spent much of their conversation thinking instead of gesticulating and formulating plans. But he was very clever, indeed. He lacked the charismatic chaos of Soundwave's own Megatron, but he seemed more likely to stay on-mission. Soundwave analyzed his recordings of this Megatron, when and how his eyes moved, the flaring and submissions of his field. He approved of how thoroughly Megatron had played the part of a converted Autobot. It had _all_ been code, up until the straightforward, but ultimately false, denial of the Decepticon movement. That nose pinch in conjunction with the order to _listen_ undoubtably meant its opposite.

_decepticons will rise again_

Of course they would. Megatron had cleverly revealed his only ally on the ship. The one called Drift must be fearsome to have accompanied Megatron into this nest of Autobots. And the communicate line? That was obvious.

“What now, Decepticon?”

Soundwave snapped to attention. Aquafend had materialized beside him, gun raised. 

_stealthy approach. he should have been sensed_

Soundwave ran an internal scan. He had picked up Aquafend's footsteps as he had approached, but his processor had been too devoted to its study of Megatron to notice. Such a thing never would have happened on the _Nemesis,_ where he had the entire ship's power at his command.

_need fuel. need power_

“Well?”

Soundwave played a recording of Megatron on his visor. _“Go see Drift. Talk to him.”_

Aquafend's biolights blinked. His gun faltered, then steadied. _“That's_ a new trick. And here I thought that was just your ugly face, not a monitor. Megatron wants you to see _Drift?”_

Soundwave _stared_ at him. Partly because the question was too foolish to deserve an answer, and partly because he had never seen a mech's biolights _blink_ before. Of all the ways these mechs were different from him- frames, fields, noses- _that_ was the most bizarre. Biolights were an intricate part of the body, smooth and flowing and unbroken. How in the world had Aquafend _blinked_ them?

Aquafend's field betrayed the scowl beneath his face plate. “Fine. I'll take you there. Move.”

~~

.:Rodimus:.

Rodimus ignored the comm. It was Megatron. Probably calling to annoy him about the anomaly Perceptor had found in the upcoming sector of space. Rodimus didn't know anything about that magical super nova crap. He'd retreated to his office the minute Perceptor had contacted the bridge with the particulars. Rodimus concentrated on his video game, squinting through the splashes of energon on the screen. He'd only thrown one cup at the monitor today. It had been a pretty good day so far.

.:Rodimus!:. This time the message was triply red flagged, flashing across his processor. Rodimus flinched, causing his character to die in-game.

“What?!” Rodimus threw the controller across the room. 

.:I do not wish to be alone with Soundwave again:.

_That_ was completely unexpected. Rodimus sat up. He paused the video game. “I thought he was creepy, too. Didn't think he was creepy enough to scare _you,_ though.”

.:It's not that:. sent Megatron. .:It's that he... there is a potential, for feelings to reignite:.

“Eww.”

.:Not _those_ types of feelings:. scoffed Megatron. He sighed over the line. .:You know why I will not handle a weapon, correct?:.

“Yeah. You're afraid you'll go out of control.” Rodimus made a gun of his fingers and thumb and aimed it at the pile of data pads Ultra Magnus had left for him to read. “Pow.”

.:Yes. It is like that. Soundwave was always my most loyal Decepticon. This one is no exception. He is _intensely_ focused on pleasing me:.

“Ewww.”

Megatron growled. .:I mean, he awakens something primal and dangerous within me:.

“The metaphors aren't making this any better.”

.:That's not a-:. The irritation on the other end was palpable. .:Do you remember the DJD's end?:.

Rodimus's snark evaporated. “Yeah,” he said quietly.

.:There are certain mechs who bring that side of me out:. sent Megatron. .:There's always an allure for it lurking. I've done everything I can think of to stamp it out. I've renounced violence. I've embraced organics. I've studied medicine. I've become _an Autobot._ And I am happy and I am grateful for every moment I no longer tread upon those more fragile than me. But. Underneath it all, there's always a potential to succumb to that allure. That's why I am very careful:.

“Okay...”

.:Denying that it's there hasn't done any good. Running away, changing factions: nothing will make it go away completely. The best I can do is acknowledge it's there and avoid the things that would exacerbate the issue:.

“Okay. I understand.” Rodimus retrieved the controller. “What did he say to you that's got you all wound up?”

.:Nothing:. There was a deep sigh. .:It's more the potential, like being at the edge of a waterfall. You either must swim back against the full force of the river, or go over. I am swimming against the river, Rodimus. Will you help me?:.

“Yeah,” said Rodimus. “I will.”


	4. Fate

Soundwave walked beside Aquafend at gunpoint, running through the medical data he had stolen from the _Lost Light._ It had swaths of redactions, but he was able to gather that Drift had once been a Decepticon named Deadlock. Brutal. Effective. Ruthless. Soundwave approved of the methods he had used in war. Even as an “Autobot,” Drift had played a part in bringing a dangerous Decepticon named Overlord aboard, which had resulted in a deadly rampage.

Such great self-restraint must be employed by the mech to live in false harmony with Autobots now. There were few, if any, on the _Nemesis_ who could do so. Soundwave predicted Drift's next murder spree would be even more devastating.

Aquafend stopped outside a door with an assortment of metal flowers and curlicues soldered around its frame. “This is Drift's place.” He leaned his gun against the wall and pulled something long from his subspace compartment. Soundwave focused on it intently. It wasn't shaped like any weapon he had seen before. It was a bundle of jointed tubes and polycloth. Aquafend shook it and it popped open.

A foldable chair.

Aquafend sat down in it heavily. “What kinda security guard would I be without this? Hurry up.” He kicked the door. “DRIFT! Visitor.” 

The door pulled aside. Soundwave ducked through the entryway. 

Soundwave had had expectations of Drift. But what he found when he entered Drift's quarters was... confusing.

The walls were painted white with strands of beads, swords, and organic artwork hung up. The room was warm with the scent of oils. Drift sat cross-legged in the middle of the floor, eyes shut, surrounded by illuminated crystals. Music, or whatever masqueraded as music in this dimension, pierced Soundwave's antenna. Beneath it, softly, the crystals were ringing. Their tones were so discordant, his processor focused on them immediately. For reasons he could not discern, Soundwave knew they _weren't right._ Soundwave shook his head, trying to clear whatever interference their off-key ringing was causing.

“Welcome,” said Drift. His voice was different from what Soundwave had expected. Thinner. Calmer. Less impressive. Drift opened one blue eye. “The unmistakable, cold energy of a Soundwave.”

Soundwave stared down at him cooly.

“Your aura is black. Your field pulses are unsteady.” Drift opened the other eye. “There is much that must be done to prepare you.”

“Preparations have commenced?” asked Soundwave. He had not expected a plan for action to be in place already. Megatron had not mentioned one.

“Of course,” said Drift. “We are all on our own journeys.”

Soundwave analyzed this statement.

_journeys = missions?_

_“aura” definition:_

_…_

_data not found_

Soundwave wondered if it wasn't just the accent that was complicating matters. He concluded that Drift was speaking in a heavily nuanced code. Soundwave was missing the key. Decoding the conversation with Megatron had taken far too long. Unwilling to waste any more time in ignorance, Soundwave said, “clarity required. Transmit the key code.”

“The key code?” Drift stood and stretched, his plating moving in ways that Soundwave's never could. He was much shorter than Soundwave had thought he would be. There were empty scabbards at his hips. “There is no key code to life, my friend.”

“Without a key code, I am unable to authenticate my interpretations of your statements,” said Soundwave, aware that he was dangerously close to spelling out what he wanted. He could not confirm Drift's room was not under surveillance. As with Megatron, he was reluctant to speak too plainly.

Drift shrugged. “You must look within. The answers you seek lie there.”

Irritation flashed through Soundwave. As quickly as it came, it went. He noted the abnormality and rebooted his emotion-suppressing protocols. He picked logically at Drift's statement. 'Look within' implied Drift was using a code Soundwave already knew. Soundwave had 380 Decepticon key codes in his database. “Employ previous codes?” he ventured.

“You must rely on your previous experiences, yes,” said Drift. 

“Specify.”

“All of them. They all made The You that you are now.” Drift smiled and slowly walked around Soundwave. “But you must be flexible and willing to live new experiences. You need to round out your life. Even out that aura. You've been terribly focused in one direction for far too long.”

Soundwave's processor mapped Drift's words, sprouting hypotheticals on the meaning of each statement. He was unable to make any sense of what Drift was saying, beyond a tentative confirmation of the use of old Decepticon codes. But there was nothing about auras in any of them. Soundwave resolved to observe now and sort the data later. Megatron had ordered him to talk to Drift, nothing more. He would listen _very_ carefully.

Perhaps a more focused discussion would help, though.

“Lord Megatron informed me of your Decepticon past,” said Soundwave. “He instructed me to listen to you talk about it. Tell me the relevant information needed for preparations to proceed.”

Drift blinked. His biolights pulsed in a pattern, albeit a different one than Aquafend's had earlier. “Uh, it's _Captain_ Megatron, here,” Drift said, his voice not as gentle as before. “The _Lord_ stuff is over with.”

Soundwave wished Drift would drop the Autobot charade, but perhaps he had good reason not to. He was a deeply-embedded spy. Drift had a lot to lose if his cover were blown. Going so far as to correct a fellow Decepticon in private took discipline, indeed. “But preparations have begun?”

Drift squinted at him. “Preparations _for your own journey._ Through _life._ Your _new_ life.”

Soundwave waited in silence for further explanation.

“Everyone on the _Lost Light_ is here because they needed a second chance. Even Megatron. Even me. And now, you.” Drift extended an arm and waved his hand over Soundwave's plating. “By Primus, how cold and deep your aura goes. It merges right into your sparkfield. That is not healthy... But you're here now. That means you are destined to change.”

Soundwave resisted the urge to smack the mech's hand away from him. Perhaps the strange ritual was an energy-measuring procedure of some kind. Deadlock was sizing him up, evaluating his physical strength. Soundwave resolved to research the units of an aura once he was dismissed. He was confident he had the right amount of aura units for a loyal Decepticon.

“Your fate lies in your own hands.”

_...fate?_

“Define: fate.”

“Ha!” Drift smiled. “That which is destined to be. Properly approached, it is when you take the very best of yourself forward with you and leave the worst of yourself behind.”

Soundwave analyzed this, his visor picking out various words and displaying them. “Fate: unknown.”

“Isn't that how it always is,” said Drift with a grin.

“Dissatisfactory answer.” Soundwave searched his memory banks. He came up with one result: a recording of Starscream waxing poetical about Megatron: _"an inglorious fate that he should remain in this vegetative state..."_

“Oh. I didn't realize your visor was a screen.” Drift stepped closer. “Who is _that?”_

“Starscream,” said Soundwave.

“Really! He has, and I truly mean this, the best-sounding Starscream voice I've _ever_ heard.” Drift made a face. “You should hear some of them-”

“Irrelevant.” Soundwave shifted. His field pulsed with distaste. Drift stepped back, touching his empty scabbards. “Megatron commanded me to listen to you. I will obey. You must supply relevant information.”

Drift narrowed his eyes. “What did Megatron say, _exactly?”_

Soundwave played the recording on his visor. _“Go see Drift. Talk to him. He used to be a Decepticon. You need someone you can communicate with on the same level. He'll help you understand.”_

“Ahhh...” Drift's expression relaxed into a smile. He held up a crystal. Soundwave almost flinched away from it. There was something _wrong_ with the way it resonated. “I see what he meant, now. The Decepticon path is guided by principles of superiority and violence. Negative actions and negative forces, intertwining. Like the harmonies in this crystal, the calls for hostility are reflected between and among mechs who have chosen to-”

Soundwave divided his processor. Half of it recorded Drift's words and biometrics and methodically ran them through the Decepticon codes. The other half concentrated on its map of the _Lost Light._ None of it listened to the words Drift said. Soundwave was careful not to display anything.

“-spent the past few hundred years trying to make up for my mistakes. At some point, you _have_ to forgive yourself. This clears the negativity from your spark and then you can help others-”

_lost light's unknown energy is ubiquitous throughout the ship. power source for trans-dimensional jumps? determine: power source. ubiquity implies systematic distribution. determine: origin of power source_

“-there are two main discourses regarding fate. One is that it is predetermined, the other is that a mech can shape their own-”

_locate: database with record of trans-dimensional jumps. determine: designation for home dimension. locate: procedure for dimensional jump_

“-but you have a _choice,_ Soundwave. You can depart that path-”

Soundwave stood, silently, through an hour of deeply coded talk. Partway through, he realized he was not strictly obeying Megatron's order to _listen._ None of the Decepticon codes had yielded comprehensive results. Soundwave resigned himself to defining Drift's words in real time, straining to follow the mech's nebulous ramblings. His dimensional wooziness peaked and valleyed, as did his attention. Just as Soundwave felt _he_ would slip into a vegetative state, Drift was called away for duty. With a bow, he promised to teach Soundwave about the 'healing divinities' the next time their paths crossed. Soundwave's field flooded with relief as they parted.

Soundwave caught himself in the pulse of that relief. It was logical to have a positive reaction to the end of a burdensome conversation. But yet... _another emotional aberration..._ Since the time he had entered the shadowzone, his emotion-suppressing protocols had failed repeatedly. It didn't matter much while in the shadowzone, but it was disruptive when it occurred around other mechs. He ran the protocols again. 

Outside Drift's quarters, the air was cool. Soundwave flared his plating, dumping excess heat from his frame. Aquafend slept in his chair, gun in his lap. Soundwave glanced up and down the hallway. It was empty. He reached for the gun.

“Ah-ah,” said Aquafend, his visor onlining. He snatched the gun and jumped out of his chair. “Think I'm one of those two-shanix security guards? Think again. I helped take down _Cyclonus_ once.”

Soundwave scanned the medical data he'd stolen for _Cyclonus._ The first sentence of his entry was **NOT A DECEPTICON.**

_interesting_

Soundwave didn't have time to contemplate that. With a _clang!_ Aquafend kicked his chair and it collapsed down. He tucked it away into his subspace compartment. “Got your fill of auras and crystal bullshit? Did it cure your case of the Cons?” 

Before Soundwave could respond, Aquafend tilted his head. “Megatron says to take you to your room. He got you a _choice_ location.” His field turned smarmy and he motioned for Soundwave to move.

Hand-picked quarters from Megatron!

_strategic location_

Soundwave and Aquafend walked. And walked. And walked. Aquafend opted to use the emergency stairways, even though Soundwave knew from his map that there were functional elevators. They journeyed down to the penultimate floor of the ship. In sharp contrast to the decks above, the hallways were dark, illuminated with only an occasional sputtering light and the mechs' own biolights. Something dripped. No matter which way Soundwave turned his head, he could not triangulate its source. Finally, Aquafend stopped at a door. It was scratched and punctured with laser burns. He pointed to the key pad on the wall next to it. “Enter 1234, then set your own key code when prompted. Remember it. Ultra Magnus _hates_ when bots forget their key codes.” Aquafend's three helm lights blinked rapidly, his field emitting a dark laughter. 

Soundwave glanced down the corridor. There was no one in sight. Or earshot. There hadn't been for the last fifteen minutes of walking. His tentacles stirred in their housing, clicking against his insides. 

Aquafend pointed his gun at Soundwave's torso. “What was that?”

Soundwave bent towards Aquafend, his biolights deepening to blue. A video of Megatron, recorded earlier while in his quarters, played on his visor.

_“While aboard this ship, you are not to harm any others, take any lives...”_

Aquafend snapped the gun up to Soundwave's visor. “What are you playing at, 'Con?”

Soundwave repeated the clip, the visuals glitched and grainy, the audio twisted. _“N- not to_ harm _harm any others, t- **take** any lives...”_ He raised his arm, his long fingers splitting the faint light of the hallway.

“Whoa!” Aquafend backed up, gun moving from Soundwave's face to his hand to his torso in quick succession.

_“t- take- **lllllllllives...”**_

“Fuck off with that!” Aquafend's biolights blinked, his field emanating distress. The gun powered up. Lines of light illuminated from its trigger down its length.

Soundwave bent his arm. Aquafend flinched. Without looking away from Aquafend, Soundwave typed 1-2-3-4 into the key pad behind him.

An upbeat, computerized voice said, “welcome to your quarters! Please reset your entry key code.”

Soundwave waited one moment more for Aquafend's field to shift from fear to realization to embarrassment to anger. He tapped in a new code. 

“Fuck you,” said Aquafend. “Enjoy this piece of shit room. It's better than mechs like you deserve.” He blinked all his lights in a fierce pattern.

Soundwave didn't know for sure what that pattern meant, but he could guess. _“F- fuck you,”_ he replayed.

“Argh!” Aquafend's trigger finger moved. Soundwave smacked the gun aside with a forearm. The blast hit the ceiling, raining bits of corroded metal down on them. Soundwave's tentacles shot out and wrapped around Aquafend's middle.

“Wha?!”

Soundwave lifted Aquafend and bashed him against the far wall. Aquafend fell to the floor with a groan. His lights blinked out. The gun clattered beside him.

“Thank you! Your entry key code has been reset.”

Soundwave picked the gun up with his tentacles. He tilted it back and forth, studying it. He ducked into his new room.

~~

Soundwave mapped his quarters with a glance. There was a berth with a dusty recharge station and a broken desk. No windows, one vent and one dim light in the ceiling. The four walls had chunks ripped out of them, gaping holes that revealed glints of wire. Soundwave tossed the gun onto the desk. He picked up the recharge station's cords with a tentacle and analyzed its connecting ends. They were incompatible with any of his ports. He would not be able to recharge without adaptors, assuming the station even worked. He would have to rely on energon. That was acceptable, once he was able to secure a source of fuel. 

Soundwave had never made a habit of sleeping. It had two benefits: 1) he had more time for his work, and 2) it contributed to the mythology the crew of the _Nemesis_ developed about him. Everyone avoided him if they could. He did nothing to discourage the practice. 

That mythology was based in truths. No, Soundwave couldn't read minds. But he could patch into any part of the _Nemesis_ to access its audio/visual feeds. No, Soundwave couldn't hear a whisper from across the universe. But he set the parameters for the _Nemesis's_ broad range scanners and was the only mech who could actually read the results. And, no, he couldn't generate his own ground bridges. He wouldn't have been stuck in the shadowzone for years if that were true. But he had been able to direct the _Nemesis's_ considerable power for that purpose- a feat undoable by any other.

It all came down to information- recognizing and interpreting patterns. And manipulating them. Recognizing and reproducing the unique tones and speech patterns of humans was trivial, for example. He could play Megatron's words through their voices at his whim. The more powerful manipulations- omnipresent surveillance and ground bridging- required an outside support structure. Soundwave was a master, but masters needed tools to reach their fullest potential. The _Nemesis_ had been his finely crafted tool.

Now he was in need of a new one.

Soundwave tossed the recharge cord aside. He put his helm to the wall and listened. The electric conduits of the _Lost Light_ hummed. The strange energy he had first felt upon waking in the med bay was _everywhere._

Soundwave touched his tendrils to the wall and concentrated. No matter which frequencies he scanned or evaluated, he was unable to identify the energy. The most similar energy signature to it in his database was when the _Nemesis_ had been poisoned by dark energon and taken on a will of its own. But the _Lost Light_ definitely was not alive. 

Soundwave contemplated the _Lost Light_ and its strange energy. What could Megatron be teaching him by housing him here? The strange energy was stronger here than elsewhere. Its source was nearby. Soundwave would investigate that.

Using the map of the room he had generated, he sent Laserbeak a command. It undocked from his chest and hovered. Its weapons system powered up and it fired a laser beam at the wall. The outer layer of the wall separated. Soundwave used his tentacles to peel it down and away, forming a rough shelf. Beyond, the guts of the ship twinkled and sparked in the low light. As Laserbeak returned to its place, Soundwave jammed his tentacles into the mess of the ship.

_incompatible_

The tips of his tentacles flitted from line to line, testing and tapping. There were no sockets or outlets or access ports. Soundwave braced himself and injected one of his tendrils directly into a thick insulated wire. The jolt it sent back to his system was painful, but manageable. He now had access to one of the ship's information pipelines. He searched for any kind of database- medical, crew, weapons, anything would do for now. He would find them all eventually.

He found a compilation of unprotected, public data. It was some kind of library system. Mechs could share texts and recordings of their choice. Soundwave scanned the archived material. Most of it was cultural: anthologies and bootlegged recordings of movies and live performances. There was a disproportionate amount of poetry. Titles flew by. Soundwave dismissed most of them as irrelevant and unimportant.

_How To Get It Up! A Self-Help Guide To Magnetism (And Some Other Things, Too) ; Windcharger_

_I Long To See You In The Halls Once Again And Discuss Matters of Great Importance ; Anonymous_

_Conjunxe Rytus: Hystorys of the Roemantyc Cybertronyan ; (modern translation- Nautica)_

_Towards Peace ; Megatron_

_Warning, Shots! Mixing Drinks For a Bar With No Guns ; Swerve_

_My Shovel, Your Face ; Crosscut_

_I Eagerly Await Your Corrections To This Poem ; Anonymous_

Soundwave backed up.

_megatron_

He yanked the data for “Towards Peace” from the ship so quickly it left his tendrils sparking. 

Soundwave sat on the berth and read the entire tome. The _Lost Light's_ Cybertron had been dominated by a ruling class completely unlike his. There, mechs had been classified by alt mode. Soundwave could not think of a worse taxonomy for a species inherently meant to change. This Megatron had brought down the Functionists, leading to the rise of the Decepticons and the war. 

It was interesting. Soundwave finally had a point of reference for this Megatron- his cautious and furtive manner. His focus on understanding the foundation of the environment and then slowly infiltrating and destroying it. It was all there. Even when he had called for expansion, the organic planets were subjected to a slow, agonizing aggression.

_infiltration... devastation_

This approach was in stark contrast to that used by Soundwave's Megatron. He had swiftly accrued followers and launched an attack on the ruling class. There had been no slow infiltration, no drawn-out period of civilian unrest. War was raged savagely and violently. There had been no room for subtleties.

Soundwave resolved to conduct himself to reflect this Megatron's will. If it was somehow true that every other dimension's war had ended with an Autobot victory, and this Megatron had witnessed that, he would be slowly and carefully formulating a plan to win. Soundwave would expose every single weakness on this ship and reveal them all to Megatron. 

That turned his thoughts back to Drift. What had he learned from Drift?

…

…

_???_

At a loss, Soundwave searched the archive for “fate.” All he came up with were titles like, “Seeking Your Purpose After The War” and “Introductory Crystals for the Busy Mech.” Soundwave didn't even download them for a scant perusal. 

Soundwave was uncertain what value Drift brought to the Decepticon cause and how cogent any preparations he made would be. Although, it _was_ true that Drift's behavior aligned with a radical interpretation of Megatron's call for infiltration. Appearing harmless and useless was a tactic rarely used in Soundwave's dimension, but he was aware of it. Soundwave was reminded of Starscream- he had often privately questioned Starscream's place in Megatron's plans. But Megatron had successfully punished Starscream into submission. Soundwave trusted this Megatron knew what he was doing.

But... 

Soundwave would begin his _own_ preparations anyhow.


	5. Inter-dimensional Hybrids

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A gentle reminder that this fic, like MTMTE/LL, will include humor, romance, and adventure, but also horror and gore.

“SOUNDWAVE.”

_bam! bam!_

Someone was banging on the door.

Soundwave rose from his broken desk. He'd spent the night redecorating. Three of the walls were peeled back. He'd also gone over the medical data he'd stolen. He was _very_ interested to find out that Drift was not the only Decepticon aboard. He wondered why Megatron had not told him about the others. Maybe they were not trustworthy. Their medical files were black with redactions. Soundwave resolved to find them once he had access to the ship's ability to track individuals.

_bam! bam!_

Soundwave gave the command for the door to slide open.

A solid block of blue and white stood on the other side. In a clear, booming voice, it said, “Soundwave: you are in violation of ordinances 37.2, _violence against a fellow crew member,_ 45.1c, _resistance/violence against a member of the Security Team,_ and 53.7, _failure to report an instance of violence you have instigated/perpetuated._ You have been called to the bridge for castigation. Exit your quarters. I will accompany you.” The block of blue and white stepped aside. 

Soundwave exited. The mech was slightly taller than he was and _very_ heavily armored. He did not carry a weapon, but they were studded throughout his frame. Soundwave would have approved, if he hadn't been an Autobot.

“I am Ultra Magnus,” boomed the mech. “Follow me.”

Soundwave trailed behind him silently. Ultra Magnus grumbled about the state of the hallway. Once they reached populated levels of the ship, mechs scattered at the sight of him. Their trip was delayed when a short mech ran past holding a beaker of liquid metal, screaming. The screams turned to whines when Ultra Magnus wrote him a citation. Soundwave identified the mech using the medical data he had stolen: Swerve. Once released, Swerve took off again, and resumed screaming down the next hallway.

As they neared the bridge, more mechs jumped and dodged out of their way. Bluestreak, Jackpot, and Whirl, who had been talking, parted hastily. No one wanted to be in the way of an Ultra Magnus on a mission.

~~

“Thank you, Magnus,” said Rodimus. “I can take it from here.”

“Would you like me to stay? I can read off the charges again-”

“No! No, that's not necessary. Thank you.” Rodimus heaved a sigh of relief after Ultra Magnus exited. He sank into his chair. _“Fantastic_ mech. Very thorough. Too thorough. Soundwave! Welcome to my office. Have a seat.”

Soundwave remained standing. Rodimus's office was a room off the bridge, brightly lit with curved walls. One side had a large window looking out into space. Another had a broken desk bolted to it with a placard that read, _“In Memorium: The First Quest.”_ The desk was carved with strange symbols and shapes that didn't match anything in Soundwave's database.

“I know being here probably isn't easy for you. But there are some ground rules we gotta lay out, the first and foremost being: no fighting. _No_ violence. I received a report.” Rodimus held up a data pad. “I told Ultra Magnus I read it. He informed me through the conversation that followed that you assaulted a member of our Security Team. Is that true?”

“Self defense.” 

Rodimus quirked an ocular arch. “Aquafend went to the med bay all smashed up. And _you_ look fine. Care to elaborate?”

Soundwave played a clip of Aquafend on his visor, his first person account of the incident.

Rodimus's eyes widened as he watched. The recording had also captured Soundwave's internal signal receivers and reticules. Aquafend frantically pointed his gun at Soundwave's middle, his head, off to the side, over and over. Reticles centered around his head and hands. Data overlays indicated Aquafend's field was emitting anger. The gun powered up. The reticle around Aquafend's trigger finger zoomed in. The finger squeezed. Soundwave's wide, flat arm soared into view and smacked the gun. There was a blast and burst of light. Rubble rained down. Aquafend moved briefly up out of sight, then was thrown backwards against the far wall. The recording ended.

“I don't suppose you have a recording of what happened right _before_ that?” asked Rodimus.

Aquafend reappeared on the visor, gun raised, clearly speaking directly at Soundwave. _“Fuck you.”_

“That... changes things. Sort of.” Rodimus rubbed the sides of his head. “He shouldn't have aimed that gun at you. I'll have another talk with Aquafend. But, Soundwave... I don't know exactly what happened down there, but it's _really_ not a good look for you to be tossing mechs around on your first day aboard.”

“Self defense,” said Soundwave. He repeated Rodimus's own words: _“Ch- changes things-ings.”_

“Right, but physical altercations are to be kept to a minimum. _Especially_ for you. Did Ratchet explain to you about the whole trans-dimensional injury issue?”

Soundwave was silent.

“Is that a yes?” Rodimus held up his hand. “Have you met Trailbreaker yet?”

Silence.

Rodimus rolled his eyes. “Don't make me _order_ you to answer me. Just one little word. Yes? No?”

Silence.

“Why are you making this so _hard?”_

Soundwave displayed a smilie face with its tongue sticking out on his visor.

Rodimus gave him a pained expression. “Okay, not gonna lie, I wish _I_ could do that.” He sighed. “As a courtesy to you, as with all mechs aboard, you're allowed pretty much free reign on the ship. This is your new home! But violence will lead to containment. Do you understand?”

Silence.

“Soundwave, do you know _why_ I pulled you out of the shadowzone?”

Soundwave displayed a complex web of data, a collection of quotes and images. Its cumulative effect was intended to inform Rodimus that Soundwave thought it was because he was an idiot.

Rodimus either didn't understand the data or didn't pay it any attention. “I'm gonna tell you, cuz I need to remind myself, too. When I found you, I found a starving, desperate mech that I _knew_ I could help. You're not trapped anymore. The universes have opened for you, Soundwave! What are your hopes? What are your _dreams?_ Everyone gets a second chance on the _Lost Light._ Me, you, Megatron. _Everyone.”_

Soundwave was silent.

“I'm grateful to be here every single day.” Rodimus pointed to the door to the bridge. “I was _so close_ to losing this ship and everyone on it, Soundwave. _So_ close. The _Lost Light_ was going to be dismantled. We took a chance and jumped dimensions and _we made it._ I don't know if there's some other me out there that _didn't_ make it. I don't know what happened to him. Given where everyone was in their lives when we bolted, given everything that had just happened, I don't know if they would've stuck around with me or not. Maybe back in my home dimension, there's a Rodimus who's slowly drinking himself to death, friendless and broken. And _every day_ I'm thankful I'm not him.” Rodimus stormed around his desk and jabbed his finger upwards in Soundwave's visor. “Life on board here isn't perfect, but it's _ours,_ and it's precious, and I won't let anything get in the way of our journey together.”

Soundwave pushed Rodimus's hand out of his face. 

Rodimus glared. “Buckle in, Soundwave, cuz no one gets booted off my ship. _Everyone_ gets a second chance. Find something that makes you happy. Find something that reminds you every day why you left the shadowzone. You're _here_ now. Remember that.”

Soundwave said nothing.

Rodimus punched a series of buttons on his desk. “Ambulon!”

A staticky reply came. _“Yes, captain?”_

“I'm sending Soundwave to you via Ultra Magnus. Something tells me you guys didn't give him the talk yesterday.”

There came a scratchy sigh. _“Yes, captain.”_

~~

_You're **here** now. Remember that._

Rodimus's words echoed in Soundwave's processor as he was accompanied back to the med bay. 

He would remember, all right. 

Soundwave remembered _exactly_ why he had left the shadowzone.

~~

Soundwave sat on a medical berth, searching Ambulon for any traces of his Decepticon heritage. His white paint flaked off, revealing purple beneath. But nothing else. No insignia or weapons. His alt mode was not evident. 

Medics were necessary, of course. Every ship needed one. But they could be a flighty bunch. Mechs too inclined towards empathy made terrible Decepticons and sometimes switched sides. It appeared that this had been the case, here. Soundwave debated how much he could trust Ambulon.

“You still feel sick?” asked Ambulon. He waved a scanning device around Soundwave. It emitted a series of high pitched tones.

Soundwave displayed biofeedback on his visor.

“Hmm. Yeah.” Ambulon scratched his face. He looked back and forth between the device and Soundwave's visor. “Everyone aboard feels that way sometimes, but it's always worst for newcomers, like you and me.”

Soundwave tilted his helm. That information had been redacted from Ambulon's medical record. Soundwave wondered if the data _wasn't_ marred by redactions, but rather that it did exist and he hadn't had enough time inside the medical database to grab it all.

“Yeah,” continued Ambulon. “We have that in common. It's kinda complicated. This ship and most of the people on it are from the same dimension. They hop between universes having adventures and stuff. Before they left their home dimension, they lost some of their crew. Their Ambulon, actually. He died. They wouldn't tell me how, but I found it in the records.” He shook his head. “Explains why _Ratchet_ of all people hugged me when they found me.”

Soundwave flicked up an image of Ratchet on his visor. He altered the image so Ratchet's face puckered in a sour expression. His cheeks deformed until they were sucked into his helm and his face went inside-out.

“Yeah. Exactly. Mr. Sunshine himself.” Ambulon scratched his side. “Anyway, they call their home dimension 0001, just cuz that's easy. Each one they've jumped to since went up a number. I'm from 1331. You're from 3244. As you might've noticed, when you leave your dimension for a new one, your frame doesn't like it too much.”

Soundwave nodded.

“It's jarring. We don't know why. It's not that the atoms are _different,_ exactly, cuz the science nerds tested that. I mean, they said they worked the same. But somehow also not.” Ambulon shrugged. “But what it means is, material from 0001 and material from 1331 are somehow different in a way they can't define. Like how you and me...” his gaze settled on Soundwave's long arms, “are definitely different.”

Soundwave nodded.

“The good news is that it'll subside after a while. Once Brainstorm and Perceptor figure out how to make fuel for you, you'll be able to absorb it. _But_ , they have to make the fuel from material we already have aboard. Your body will start to incorporate matter from our current fuel mix. The discomfort will ease up, because you'll become slightly more like everyone else here.”

Soundwave displayed a frowning face. 

“I know, it sounds weird. But there's nothing else we can do. The _Lost Light_ is a remarkable ship, but it can't make its own fuel. Every once in a while we have to stop somewhere and fuel up and then another dimension gets added into the mix. They mix the new fuel into the old in portions so it gets introduced slowly. Everyone here is drinking a multidimensional drink. We're a ship full of inter-dimensional hybrids.”

_exploitable weakness_

“How long does one batch of fuel last?” asked Soundwave.

“Time doesn't really... work right for us. I mean, whose time do we use? 0001's? Yours? But maybe... a year? Five years? Depends on what we use it for.” Ambulon gestured to Soundwave emphatically. “Fuel replenishment and mixing isn't something _you_ have to worry about. Except that it'll be a big jolt from what you're used to.”

Soundwave catalogued this data. It was important and interesting, with numerous applications. It implied the entire crew subsided on the same food source. Such a weakness would be trivial to exploit. 

_poison_

“But what it really means is... even if you could go home, which you can't, you wouldn't _feel_ at home there anymore. It would take a while for your body to readjust itself. If it even _could_ readjust itself.” Ambulon glanced at the medical monitors. “I'm not convinced you could ever go back to being 100% your own self, even if you went back home and spent the rest of your life there. Something from the _Lost Light_ would linger on.” He shrugged. “Not a big deal to me. I figure you'd just incorporate stuff from your home dimension back into your frame, but some people get touchy about it.”

A small diagnostic drone swooped down from the ceiling. It was red and white with two little arms and winglets. It handed Ambulon a data pad.

“Ah, thank you.” He frowned as he read its contents.

Soundwave curbed the urge to pluck the little drone from the air. It was not alive: it had no field, and Soundwave could detect the transmissions between it and the med bay's computer. The drone beeped at Ambulon and returned to a cubbyhole in the wall, wiggling backwards into place. There were two other cubbies next to it, empty. Soundwave recorded and internalized the frequencies it used for its transmissions.

“You seem to be a pretty efficient type,” said Ambulon. “Looks like you'll be okay if it takes a few more days for your energon to be synthesized. Other than the disorientation, are you feeling any pain?”

“Negative.”

“Have any other concerns? Questions?”

Soundwave weighed his options. He did have questions. He felt he could only ask them of Drift or Ambulon, and he was greatly disinclined to be anywhere near Drift again. Megatron hadn't mentioned Ambulon as an ally, but he _was_ a former Decepticon...

_calculated risk_

“Affirmative. Where is Spinister? Where is Misfire?”

Ambulon's biolights flashed. His field flared with shock. He stared in slack-jawed disbelief as Soundwave listed off names.

“-and Nickel?”

“How do you _know_ about them?!” cried Ambulon. “You've been here less than a day!”

“Soundwave: superior.”

“Soundwave: scary,” said Ambulon. He shook his head. “I... I... I mean, yeah, we usually show the newcomers, cuz it really gets the point across, but First Aid is better suited for-”

Soundwave stepped towards him. _“Show me.”_

“Okay, okay.” Ambulon grimaced. “The medical bay is bigger than it looks.” He pointed. “That's a false wall. There's a room behind it.”

Soundwave compared the room's size to his map of the _Lost Light._ It was true. The portion of the map designated _Medical Bay_ was smaller in reality.

_hidden compartments... there may be more elsewhere. interesting_

Soundwave followed Ambulon to the false wall. It was very well constructed, perfectly mimicking the other walls' detailed lines and lights. Ambulon pushed a series of buttons and a door slid back. The room beyond was dark, faintly tinged with pink light. “C'mon,” said Ambulon.

The hidden room was large with rows of consoles and holo monitors lining one wall. It was warm and musty. It smelled something like energon, though not any Soundwave had ever encountered. There were no overhead lights. Illumination was provided by six huge columns of glass set into sturdy bases built into the floor. Pipes and wires fed into them from the top. Each column housed a mech in pink energon. They were contorted, knees bent, backs arching. The smallest one kneeled. Soundwave presumed their positions were an attempt to keep them submerged. The energon was only as high up as their optics or visors, leaving bits of their bodies exposed to the air above. They all had severe damage and burned, blistering paint. They all wore Decepticon badges.

“What is this?” asked Soundwave. He extended a tentacle. Ambulon yelped and jumped back. Soundwave stepped forward to touch his tendrils to the glass. His foot _tinked_ against something. He looked down.

Bunched around the columns were tiny vials of energon in different colors, glowing softly. Soundwave reset his visor to better filter the low light. Now he saw hand-written notes and dolls and metallic flowers nestled between the vials. “What is _that?”_ he asked. He plucked one of the vials from the floor and held it up to his visor. It was covered in a layer of dust.

“Hey! Put that back,” said Ambulon. “That's innermost energon. Mechs put it here as a sign of respect and mourning. This is like... a sacred place for the 0001 crew. You're not supposed to touch that.”

Soundwave tilted the vial back and forth. “Define: innermost energon.”

Ambulon reached for the vial. After a few seconds of tugging back and forth, Soundwave let him take it. Ambulon placed it back on the floor. “Mechs like, uh, everyone we've ever found except for you, have a spark chamber. There's special energon in that chamber. Innermost energon. It's bathed in spark light. Giving up a little bit of it for someone is an intimate gesture.”

“Incorrect. I have a spark chamber.”

“Er, well, you _do,_ but it's really different from ours.” Ambulon made a circle with his hands. “Ours is like a ball with the spark inside, and yours,” he flattened his fingers, “it's kinda like...” he moved his hands apart. Then closer together. Then apart again. Then he made two V-shapes with his fingers and waggled them back and forth. “I dunno. It's _there,_ but it's connected to your lines really weirdly.”

“Irrelevant,” said Soundwave. The prongs of his tentacle opened. He set them against the glass. Little tapping noises came as his tendrils touched the glass, sensing and listening. The mech inside, as far as he could tell, was completely offline. Soundwave glanced at the name embossed at the base of the column. _**Spinister.**_ “What is this containment vessel? What is its purpose?”

“This is the last bit of pure 0001 on the ship,” said Ambulon. “These mechs were... friends? I don't really understand it, but they were all in a group together. A Decepticon group.”

Soundwave nodded.

“Around the time the crew needed their first refueling was when they got to dimension 0036. The crew bought energon in 0036 but it made them sick. That was when they realized the price of dimension-hopping. They couldn't just drink any old thing from any old dimension. There was panic at first. They thought they were going to starve. They experimented with mixing the 0036 with 0001, and it was a bit better, but not ideal. The science nerds said they needed matter that's dimensionally neutral. Someone theorized that the core of a collapsed star could be harnessed to synthesize fuel from, because it's pure neutrons or something. This is the group that volunteered to get it.” Ambulon's mouth pulled back. “They weren't successful.”

Soundwave nodded.

“They were damaged to the point of needing extensive repairs. Ratchet had them put into stasis and suspended in the remaining pure 0001 energon until he could get the right parts. They didn't find the right parts until 0089. And _that_ was when they found out that you can't slap metals from one dimension into a mech from a different dimension.” Ambulon scratched his arm. “Not just metals. Everyone here thinks I have flaky paint syndrome, because their Ambulon did. But that's not what this is. This is _their_ paint failing to stick to _my_ frame. It might stick to yours just fine- it does to Trailbreaker- but not to me, for some reason. Everything depends on what you're made of. Where you came from.”

Soundwave searched his database for Trailbreaker. He displayed an image of Trailbreaker waving. Part of his hand was missing. 

“Yeah. About that. Trailbreaker got part of his hand cut off during his war. He hopped aboard and Ratchet went to treat him, but he can't innervate the metal Ratchet has. That means Ratchet can furnish him with repairs, but Trailbreaker can't feel them or move them. His lines won't grow into that metal.” Ambulon pointed back to the med bay. “Did you notice the little vats of metal in the other room? We have some metal specialists aboard and they've been working on this project forever. They've basically said you need to be a god to figure out what's going on. The atoms... I dunno, something about the metals being slightly different between dimensions.” Ambulon shrugged. “What it means for _me_ , and you, is that if we get hurt, we can't be fixed by the metal they have aboard. Rodimus and Megatron have very strict no-fighting policies. If 0001 mechs get hurt, they can melt pieces of the walls and make replacement parts.” Soundwave thought of the holes in the wall of his quarters. “But you and me? We're out of luck.” Ambulon glanced at Soundwave's frame. “So take good care of yourself.”

“Why do they not return Trailbreaker to his dimension for repairs?”

Ambulon grimaced. “No one told you? _I_ don't want to be the one that tells you.”

_“Tell me.”_

Ambulon's field flashed with fear. “Okay! Once you come aboard, you can never go back. The _Lost Light_ can't navigate its jumps. They're random. They're never duplicated. Each new dimension we navigate to is unique.”

Anger swept through Soundwave. Ambulon stepped back. Soundwave ran his emotion-suppressing protocols. “Unacceptable,” he said.

Ambulon raised his hands in a placating gesture. “Sorry. If you want more details about that, you'll have to talk to Perceptor.”

_perceptor_

“Sometimes when a mech gets _really_ hurt, Ratchet will take out a bit of this to mix in with their repairs. They heal faster. That's why the levels are low. The columns used to be full.” Ambulon pointed to Nickel. The tips of her antenna were exposed to the air, above the level of the energon. They were a dull, gray color. “The whole crew takes it very seriously. Ratchet has to go through a ton of paperwork now to extract a few drops. It's the last connection they have to home.”

Soundwave stalked over to the consoles. He tapped at the holographic keyboards with his tendrils.

“Hey! What did I just say! Don't touch anything!” Ambulon reached for Soundwave's tentacle, then thought better of it. “Come on, let's go back. ”

The consoles were password locked. Unaccessible with a witness present. Soundwave memorized the layout of the room and followed Ambulon out. The false wall slid shut behind them.

Across the med bay, in the quarantine lab, a group of mechs glanced up at them. They stood around beakers of melted metal, piles of metal shavings, crystals, and tubes of energon. One of the beakers bubbled over. With excited shouts, their attention was drawn back to their work.

“Long story short, don't get hurt,” said Ambulon. He lowered the medical berth Soundwave had sat on to its usual height.

“Understood.”

“Here,” said Ambulon. He handed Soundwave a canister. “That has our current fuel mix in it. Take a sip every day. It'll help acclimate you to what we've got. When Brainstorm finishes your fuel, he'll be mixing it with that anyway, to help stretch it.”

The canister was magnetized. Soundwave stuck it to his side.

“Of course, if it makes you feel really sick, stop drinking it,” said Ambulon.

“Understood,” said Soundwave.

“Uh.” Ambulon tapped his fingertips together. “That's it for now. I think Ultra Magnus is waiting for you in the hall.”

Soundwave nodded. As he headed for the door, he sent a transmission to the diagnostic drone in the cubbyhole. It wiggled an arm.

_success_

As Soundwave fell into step behind Ultra Magnus, he went over what he had learned. Soundwave approved of Ambulon. He was knowledgable, straightforward, and easy to scare. Soundwave made a small amendment to his burgeoning plans. Ambulon would not be destroyed.

~~

.:Captain?:.

Rodimus was sitting with his legs up on his desk. He held a bowl of mini cube snacks. Rodimus inched his heel over to hit a button. His foot knocked aside a stack of data pads. “Yo.”

.:Did you tell Soundwave about the Scavengers?:.

Rodimus frowned. “No?”

.:He... he knew about them:.

“Huh.” Rodimus eyed the data pads Ultra Magnus and Ratchet had given him about Soundwave. Maybe he should read them. “Thanks, Ambulon. Did you tell him the stuff?”

.:I did:.

“Did he understand?”

.:He says he did:.

Rodimus picked up one of the data pads. It was entitled, _Soundwaves: An Exhaustive Compilation of All Previously Encountered Soundwaves._ Rodimus tossed it aside. This Soundwave was more alien than _any_ Cybertronian they had ever found. He doubted a data pad was smart enough to know that. “Did he sound like he meant it?”

.:Does he sound like _anything?_ Except terrifying, I mean. I liked it better when he repeated your voice back at us:.

“Heh.” Rodimus set the bowl of snacks down. He spread the data pads like a fan across the desk. “Thank you, Ambulon. Looks like it's time to get reading.”

Or... 

_Maybe_ he'd get Drift to do it for him.


	6. Points of Light

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a time capsule comment. Due to the Covid-19 outbreak, I haven't had the creative energy I once had for this fic. I have 150ish pages written, but they're all out-of-order scenes. There's still a lot I need to figure out. I was planning and enjoying the fic process until the pandemic hit. Now, I am very stressed.
> 
> I implore you to do what needs to be done. You know what needs to be done. Stay inside, wash your hands. You've heard it a million times. Please be healthy, please be safe, please be secure.
> 
> Further updates to this fic may be sporadic. Thank you for your support. Comments mean so much. I know many of you have more free time than before. I know you want stories to read. Thank you for understanding if chapters don't come out as quickly as you would like during this stressful period. If you would like to reach me for any reason, I'm on pillowfort as AltraViolet and my gmail is altraviolet00.
> 
> In the meantime, I do have other fics you're welcome to, including a nearly 150,000 word completed fic! Check out the prequel [“Face The Light”](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13771812) and then [“Face The Past.”](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15054602/chapters/34900733) Both are also about a cracky rarepair close to my heart. Thank you and be well~

Ultra Magnus gave Soundwave a brief tour of the nonresidential, upper decks of the ship: the med bay, the cafeteria, the bars, the various common/entertainment areas. He waved at the elevator to the oil reservoir as they passed and gave a cryptic acknowledgment of an engine room and “its related structures.”

They looped around again to one of the bars and Ultra Magnus sighed. “Rodimus has _specifically_ requested I give you a tour of the inside of this establishment. Specifically, of the barstool layout and the menu.” He narrowed his eyes. “You don't have any weapons hidden in your frame, do you?”

Soundwave said nothing.

Ultra Magnus gave him a withering look and activated the door.

Mechs were cheering and shouting and laughing. The screens on the walls jibbered with human entertainment. Ultra Magnus led Soundwave through the ruckus to the bar, behind which huge columns of energon stood, not unlike those housing the Decepticons in the secret med bay room. Unlike those columns, these were filled with different colored energon and no bodies. Engex bottles of different shapes and sizes lined the anterior of the bar. Decorative glasses were neatly stacked in tiers on the bar top. Both mechs sat on stools that were too short for them.

A mech with a chevron – Soundwave recognized him from before, Bluestreak – approached from behind the bar. At the sight of Ultra Magnus, his chest plates, which had been cracked apart, _clanged_ together. He stood up straight and gave them a customer service smile. “Hey! Uh. What can I get for you?”

“One glass of non-intoxicating, flavor-free, single-filtered engex for me and a Newcomer's Puregrade for him,” said Ultra Magnus.

“Sure thing,” said Bluestreak. He ducked to gather supplies for the drinks.

A voice whispered from beneath the bar, “is that Magnus? Charge him double. He wrote me a citation today.”

Bluestreak snickered softly.

Soundwave glanced at Ultra Magnus. He didn't seem to have heard the conversation. He was glaring at a group of mechs juggling rods of energon on the other side of the room.

“Hey, WOW,” said the voice from beneath the bar. Swerve popped up into view, holding a tray. He pointed at Soundwave. “You are _freaky_ up close.”

“Manners,” said Ultra Magnus dryly. He took the glass Bluestreak handed him. “Thank you.” 

Swerve retrieved a step stool and climbed it to get a better look at Soundwave. He waved his hand in front of Soundwave's visor. “Hellooooo-”

“Swerve!” said Ultra Magnus. “I've brought him here for socialization, not objectification!”

Swerve ignored him. “Are you related to Froid?”

Soundwave leaned away from him. He scanned his database for _Froid._ There was one image. He displayed it.

“Whoa, your face is a monitor. Yeah, that's Froid. That's not an answer, though. Are you?” Swerve looked at Ultra Magnus. “Is he?”

“Unlikely,” said Ultra Magnus. 

“He's quiet for a Soundwave,” said Bluestreak warily. 

Bluestreak placed a glass in front of Soundwave. It was tall and plain, filled with a glowing pink liquid. Soundwave let out a tentacle. He wrapped the prongs around the glass. One tendril crept over its lip, darting for the liquid. He braced himself for what would surely be an unpleasant sensation-

“WHOA!” Swerve shouted. He jumped off the step stool and pointed to the wall. “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Didn't you see the sign?”

Soundwave looked up. There was a sign that read: **No Guns, No Swords, No Briefcases,** and below that, scrawled hastily in marker, **No Tentacles.**

“That's new,” said Ultra Magnus, raising one ocular arch. “If anything, you would have put that up after we visited 2957, the-”

“-dimension of tentacled horrors, yes yes, we don't need to relive any of that,” said Swerve. “But none of _them_ came aboard as permanent crew!” 

Ultra Magnus lowered his ocular arch. He evaluated Soundwave: hunched on a barstool too short for him, knees jutting into the air, fingers trailing on the ground. Ultra Magnus took in the height of the bar, the glass, and the location of Soundwave's elbow joints in relation to the two. After some quick geometry, he said, “I think he's making do with what he has, at the moment.”

“Aquafend came in late last night with a face patch,” said Swerve. “Sat right there and told us all about him. I don't want any tentacle trouble in this bar!” He glanced at Bluestreak. “That's not a sentence I thought I'd have to say _twice_ in my lifetime.”

Bluestreak shrugged. “It's the _Lost Light.”_

“Hands or nothing!” said Swerve, brandishing a dish towel.

Soundwave's visor flashed red. His field pulsed with irritation. He ran his emotion-suppressing protocols. He leaned back and, with a show of great difficulty, bent his long arms. His forearms _thudded_ onto the bar top. His elbows whined as he semi-transformed them, trying to angle his arms so he could grab his glass. He swiped for it, missed, and hit Ultra Magnus's glass. It shot across the bar and smashed into another patron.

“Ow!” Hound glared and wiped engex off his chest.

Soundwave tried his other arm. It swept across the bar top, again missing his glass, and smacked the minibot next to him in the head. 

“Ow!” Tailgate hopped up onto his barstool. “What gives! Whoa.” His blue visor crackled with energy as he stared at Soundwave. 

Soundwave ignored the growing attention of the mechs around him and continued trying to reach for his glass. He smacked patrons and smashed bottles and almost toppled a pyramid of inverted drink cups. Bluestreak dived at the last second to save it.

“Oh my god!” shouted Swerve. “Stop!” He grabbed Soundwave's forearms and pushed them against the bar. “Just stop!” He squealed and yanked his hands away. “Why are you cold??”

Soundwave's point thus demonstrated, he pulled his forearms off the bar and let them dangle at his sides again. He took a noisy _slurp_ of his drink through his tendrils. It burned. His line filters sent him an agonized evaluation: as before, it wouldn't kill him, but it wouldn't be pleasant.

Ultra Magnus surveyed the chaos around him. Bluestreak swept broken glass away as Swerve mopped up spilled engex. Tailgate was tugging on Cyclonus's arm and Hound was heading for the door. “We've sat here for 3.74 minutes,” he groaned.

“Get- just get away from the bar,” said Swerve, wrapping his arms protectively around the pyramid of cups. “Go to a booth or something. Stay away from the decorations!”

Ultra Magnus stood. “Do send over another drink.” Soundwave unfolded himself from his seat and followed Ultra Magnus to the furthest, darkest corner. They slid into a booth. Ultra Magnus clasped his hands before him, as if trying to forcibly insert a measure of calm into his immediate surroundings. Soundwave positioned his tendrils so they would more noisily suck up his drink. “I can see you are going to be what Drift generously calls _an experience,”_ Ultra Magnus said. He pushed a data pad across the table. “This is an information pad containing indices and maps and miscellaneous facts, as well as, and most importantly, an unabridged Code of Conduct that you are to abide by.”

With his other tentacle, Soundwave took the data pad. He flicked through it quickly, memorizing its contents.

“Are you actually reading it?” Ultra Magnus asked, his field letting out a bit of surprise. 

Soundwave displayed, _Subsection 147.2: Ship-wide Emergencies: in the event of a Ship-wide Emergency, alarms will sound and red lights will flash. Unless otherwise directed, if you have been assigned a battle station, you are to report to it immediately. If you are a noncombatant, you will go directly to your hab suite or nearest safe room,_ on his visor.

“Well, that is... unexpected,” said Ultra Magnus. He reset his vocalizer. “Everyone on the _Lost Light_ is assigned a position. Newcomers are given up to two weeks to familiarize themselves with the ship and crew and then may submit requests for placement.” He eyed Soundwave's frame. “I assume you specialize in communications?”

Soundwave did not dignify that question with an answer. He augmented his personal map of the _Lost Light_ with information from the data pad. Its map, he noted, did not mark the secret med bay room in any way.

“Right... frankly, _some_ have voiced concerns over giving you access to ship information so early on,” said Ultra Magnus, “but _others_ are keen to have you integrated as soon as possible. Given your violent outburst last night-”

Soundwave played a clip in Rodimus's voice. _“Self defense.”_

“-er, yes,” said Ultra Magnus. “That matter is still being investigated. Nevertheless, I would implore you to adhere to our Code of Conduct. It will serve you well during your adjustment period.” Bluestreak dropped off a new drink for him. “Thank you.” He took a big swig. “Transparency is a key component of Rodimus and Megatron's leadership. We've all endured too much for it _not_ to be. At this point, I can't tell if you're the type who will abide by restrictions because you're smart enough to understand _why_ they're restricted, or if you're the type to go traipsing into places where you don't belong simply because you've been told not to. All I can tell you is the following: one, if you are injured, you _cannot_ be healed, and if you are gravely wounded, _you will die._ Two, there are a few areas of the ship you are forbidden from entering because _they are very dangerous._ Of those, the engine room is probably the most important. In an effort to smother any delinquent desires to go exploring, I will _tell you_ why it is forbidden in no uncertain terms. The _Lost Light_ utilizes a special engine that allows it to hop dimensions. Contact with its energies is dangerous for 0001 mechs, sometimes fatal. Obviously, we do not know what its energies would do to _you,_ but you are welcome to peruse Section 531d to see what exposure has done to mechs in the past.”

Soundwave's visor flickered with images of dead mechs, twisted in agony or partially embedded in walls.

“Now that any possible mystery as to _why_ the engine room is forbidden has been dispelled, are you feeling any lingering desire to trespass?”

“I feel nothing,” said Soundwave.

Ultra Magnus startled. “I- yes, good. Is that your real voice?”

Soundwave nodded.

Ultra Magnus drained his glass. He shifted away from Soundwave's tentacles as they coiled and slithered across the table. Soundwave was engrossed in the data pad. Images and numbers flickered on his visor. After a few minutes, Ultra Magnus said, “I assume you've seen the index of positions available. Do any of them align to your interests?”

Soundwave blanked his visor. In Ambulon's voice, he said, _“Perceptor.”_

Ultra Magnus looked at him uneasily. “I don't think he's taking on, er, interns, at the moment.”

_**“Perceptor.”** _

“Very well,” said Ultra Magnus. “Finish your drink and we'll see him. Excuse me one moment.” Ultra Magnus slid out of the booth. He crossed the room in seven strides and pried a rod of energon out of Riptide's hands. He had been trying to shove it into an electrical outlet.

Soundwave finished absorbing the data pad's information. He opened the canister Ambulon had given him. He stuck a tendril in.

**!!!**

It was as if he had been struck by the most foul-tasting lightning imaginable. Soundwave nearly flung the canister across the bar. He gathered himself and poured a minuscule amount into his drink.

**!**

Soundwave pushed the glass away. It was tainted. No good could ever come of it.

“You gonna drink that?”

A shadow fell over Soundwave. He looked up. A blue mech with a field like a jackhammer had appeared next to his table. He held a dainty drink glass, empty, between two strange pincers.

“The name's Whirl. Your dimension undoubtably had a Whirl and he was nowhere near as cool as me.”

Soundwave stared blankly.

“Yeah, I said it. Anyway. You look like someone who wants to punch someone else in the face. I've got just the place for it. Whirl's Punching Things Club. Bottom of the ship. Open floor fight tomorrow night. Come on down and win Jackpot some money so he'll stop begging me for change.”

_fight?_

Soundwave didn't know what to make of this. Every mech he had encountered so far had made it very clear that violence had consequences. Autobots willing to risk permanent injury for frivolous means would no doubt be the first to rise up against Megatron.

_must identify_

“Not much of a talker, eh? Good. I like that. Oh, and the password is _Tailgate's punchable face._ It's an old joke. Don't actually punch Tailgate. You wouldn't survive it.” Whirl clicked his empty pincers together twice, grabbed Soundwave's cup, and trotted away.

Soundwave glanced at Tailgate, sitting at the bar. He did, indeed, have a punchable face. A very punchable face that did not betray any self-defense capabilities. Soundwave focused on the conversation he was having with the mechs around him. The ambient sounds of the room faded as he concentrated.

“-ember that time Ultra Magnus _almost_ brought an alt-dimension Prowl aboard? And we had to get the entire ship together to veto it?” Swerve's expression hovered between horrified and disgusted. 

“Aww, he was nice,” said Tailgate. “Bit of a strict mech.”

_“No,”_ said Bluestreak. “He was a _sneaky_ mech. Prowls are _always_ bad news.”

“But it begs the question,” continued Swerve. “Don't look at him when I ask, _don't_ look at him. But who would be worse, Prowl or Soundwave?”

“That's a moot point, isn't it?” asked Tailgate. “We already _have_ a Soundwave. It doesn't matter how bad he is. He's already here.”

“Hmm.” Bluestreak tapped his chin. “I'd say Prowl's worse. Soundwave probably doesn't care enough to go digging into your personal life for blackmail material that he'd publicize unless you complied with some intricately terrible plot involving betraying five of your closest friends.”

“How curiously specific,” said Tailgate.

“Bluestreak's right,” said Swerve. “Prowl is scary-subtle. Soundwave looks more like your straightforward 'stab a tentacle into your stomach and suck your guts out' type.”

“He's listening to you,” said Cyclonus.

Swerve dove beneath the bar. Bluestreak and Tailgate startled. They looked at Soundwave. Soundwave stared back.

“Cyclonus!” cried Tailgate. “Why didn't you say something earlier?!”

Cyclonus's deep chuckle softened as the hulking form of Ultra Magnus eclipsed Soundwave's view of the bar. He had a fistful of confiscated energon rods. “Ready?”

Soundwave rose wordlessly from the booth and followed him out.

~~

Perceptor's lab, or, as it turned out, Brainstorm and Perceptor's lab, was a large, circular room filled with monitors, scientific equipment and holographic projectors. Experiments and inventions in various states of completion littered the tables on the periphery. One table was dedicated entirely to energon: glass vessels bubbled with liquids and heating elements whirred. Another was dedicated to weaponry. A sword that looked like a gray imitation of one of Drift's lay on the table. It had a gun for a handle. Soundwave looked closer. The blade was actually a series of very thin interlocking guns. A note was attached to it in two different handwriting styles:

**SWUN!**  
_no, that's terrible_  
**GWORD!**  
_somehow worse_  
**SWORDY-GUN-GUN!**  
_come now_  
**BLASTABBER!**  
_that's the one_

Brainstorm was a mech equally expressive in field and frame. He gesticulated wildly, wings fluttering and dipping. Perceptor was more collected, calmly evaluating Soundwave like he was a distant target. Soundwave noted his asymmetrical eyes.

_“Wow,_ you are _weird,”_ said Brainstorm. He grabbed Soundwave's arm and inspected it. “I have been _waiting_ to meet you.” He pointed to Soundwave's plating. “Do you see that? Do you see that, Percy?”

Soundwave yanked his arm out of Brainstorm's grasp. 0001 mechs were _far_ too comfortable touching him for his liking.

“He's cold,” said Brainstorm. “Fascinating. I predicted that based on his energon readings, didn't I?”

“You did,” said Perceptor. He had one hand at his chin, studying the biolights of Soundwave's frame. There were large, circular alt mode pieces stuck to Perceptor's arms. They weren't wheels. Soundwave wasn't sure what they were. They rotated slowly as Perceptor thought: clockwise, counter-clockwise.

Brainstorm's wings fanned out. “We've never found anyone like you, Soundwave. Not in thousands of dimensions.” He grabbed a few glass tubes of energon and held them up. One contained a thick purple liquid- Soundwave's own blood. “We've been working on synthesizing a fuel additive for you. Something that takes the edge off of our in-house mix.”

“Something that will allow you to absorb its energy,” specified Perceptor. “Efficiently and painlessly.”

“You probably won't want to bother with the details,” said Brainstorm. “But we've got them. We've got them all.” He pushed a button and a holographic screen lit up with streams of data and diagrams. “As you know, energon, being a solid form of _energy_ , but not in the way _matter_ is a solid form of energy, is composed of-”

Soundwave recorded Brainstorm's excited explanation, but concentrated on the data projected before him. It described the compositional make up of energon. Soundwave had information in his database that gave him context for this data: Ratchet's synth en and Megatron's dark energon. Soundwave had worked at their periphery and naturally absorbed that data without contemplating it. He had filed it away in case Megatron needed the formulas later and the _Nemesis_ was unavailable. But Soundwave had never given any of it a thought of his own.

Soundwave mentally overlaid the core components of synth en and dark energon onto Perceptor's recipe. The similarities were there. Perceptor's mix was undeniably a synthetic energon, which Soundwave could tell by comparing it to the synth en. And it was not dangerous, like dark energon. It was something slightly different. The components of the energons were similar. The ratios of core components and trace elements comprised the differences.

When Brainstorm finally ceased talking long enough to run across the lab to grab an invention, Soundwave said to Perceptor, “tell me why the _Lost Light_ cannot return to a previously-visited dimension.”

Perceptor quirked an ocular arch. He tapped at his wrist. The holographic data winked out. A dome appeared, covered in thousands of dots of light all connected together. “This is the map of our journey. Every node represents a different dimension. The single line joining them tracks the path we have taken.”

With a glance, Soundwave saw the order underlying the apparent chaos of the dots. They were stacked in layers in three-dimensional space. There wasn't a pattern to the way the journey-line connected them, though. It might stay on one level for three nodes, then dart up six levels, down two, up one, down four...

Perceptor steepled his fingertips. “The simplest answer to your question is that the _Lost Light_ itself is bound by its own matter. You will find this is a common theme between all of the problems we face skipping through dimensions. Our navigation system is made of the matter from our dimension, and thus it is _suited for_ that dimension. We've altered it the best we can, but often it cannot take readings.”

Soundwave thought back to what he had observed the night before. “The _Lost Light_ does not use autopilot.”

“Correct. We are unable to load coordinates into our navigation system because we simply cannot _detect_ them. Without being able to load a target coordinate, we cannot control our jumps.” Perceptor's gaze flitted over Soundwave's antenna. “Imagine if I removed your antennae and then asked you a question from across the ship. It would be preposterous to expect you to answer.”

It was preposterous that Perceptor thought Soundwave _wouldn't_ have a way to hear from across the ship. Soundwave tilted his head. He tried to think of the most general way to state that without revealing too much. “The ship itself could be harnessed as a means to listen.”

“Ah, that it _can,”_ said Perceptor approvingly. “And, indeed, we've theorized that if we could understand the underlying architecture that connects the dimensions, we might be able to predict where our next jump took us, or perhaps even _guide_ the ship to a dimension of our choosing. Alas, we have yet to make headway in that arena.” 

Soundwave directed his focus on the hologram dome. “Why are the nodes arranged in layers?”

“We found certain... hmm. It is difficult to explain it without using a sophisticated lexicon.”

“Soundwave: superior. I will understand any lexicon, given sufficient definitions.”

One corner of Peceptor's mouth turned up. “Very well. The equations governing the transferral of matter to energy and vice versa remain constant across the, shall we say, _multiverse._ That is what this dome represents: all the dimensions in one place. Given that there _are_ physical constants between them, we are uncertain why matter from one dimension should behave differently from another. We've evaluated thousands of samples at the atomic level and can find no reason why they are incompatible. We've tried to look closer, but we are limited in our ability to observe at a _subatomic_ level. We cannot determine the specifics. But we _have_ been able to identify an underlying _energy_ to that matter. There are eleven different energies. We have consistently found that every dimension we visit falls under one of them. The eleventh being that found in _your_ dimension, which was heretofore unknown.” Perceptor cocked his head. “This invites the idea that there are _even more_ energies out there. For years, all dimensions have fallen under one of _ten_ energy types, so we thought there were only ten. But your dimension disproves that.”

“I was in a pocket within my universe for many years.”

“I'm quite certain that should not matter,” said Perceptor. “Can you elaborate?”

“Shadowzone.” Soundwave displayed the data describing it on his visor. 

“Ahh...” Perceptor watched intently. When the data cascade ended, he typed furiously into a keyboard. “I don't think that should matter too mu- ah.” He pointed to two identical graphs. “The underlying energy of your dimension and your dimension's shadowzone is the same. It is the _application_ of that energy within the spacetime of your dimension that defined the shadowzone. If you will, whether one fashions a blade or a pen from iron, and commits to the use of each object as intended, the iron remains the same.”

“Understood.”

“So therefore, there are eleven layers of nodes in the dome,” said Perceptor. He pointed to the highest dot, one link back on the _Lost Light's_ trail. “This is yours.”

Soundwave stared at the little dot. 

_home. target. must return._

Perceptor ran his hand through the hologram, deforming its bright stars. “0001 was designated as '1' energy. It is at the bottom, here. Every dimension is thus organized as we uncover its intricacies.”

Soundwave followed the _Lost Light's_ trail through thousands of dots. He felt something prickle in the back of his processor. He was unable to define it. It felt like he was missing something concerning their layout. “Are there other characteristics you found that differ between dimensions?”

Perceptor shook his head. “This was the most profound and- admittedly- easiest to observe difference between them.” He hit a button and tapped one of the nodes. A window popped up with streams of data. “You can tap any node on the map and the data we have on it will come up. I do concede that we may have missed something. Thus, we have an extensive library of samples from every dimension that we could safely collect matter from. If you had a proposal regarding a parameter to search for, we could scan the samples.”

“Isn't he handsome when he talks,” said Brainstorm behind them. He was staring in rapt attention at Perceptor.

“Irrelevant,” said Soundwave.

_“Totally_ relevant,” said Brainstorm. He held up a patchwork device. “This little thingy is the key to getting you your fuel additive. We don't know how it works, we just know it does. But since you're from a dimension with a new energy type, it's going to take a while for us to get it to work right.”

“We are restricted to the matter we have available,” said Perceptor. He pointed to a flask of energon. “This is our current fuel mix, which contains energon from dimensions with energy 1. It can still cause discomfort, though, which tells me there's a subdivision of characteristics we are unable to define.” Perceptor launched into a detailed description of the mathematical models he had generated which described the energies of each dimension.

Soundwave was not a stupid mech. His tasks often placed him in the vicinity of Starscream and Shockwave's work, so he was vaguely familiar with the terms Perceptor used. But he lacked the in-depth knowledge to properly and fully understand everything Perceptor said. It reminded him of being in the company of Drift. But Soundwave felt disinclined to murder Perceptor for it.

“-and, of course, there's always the hypothesis that the _Lost Light_ can only jump to dimensions where it, and by extension, everyone on it, doesn't already exist. And once we've jumped to a dimension, we _do_ exist in it, so we are never able to return to it.”

“I don't think that's it,” said Brainstorm. “There _has_ to be a way to return to-”

Perceptor sighed. “Yes, I know. Mirage comes in here every few weeks, prodding and poking around and asking the same thing. 'How can I go home?' I've told him very firmly that if we find out, he'll be the first to know. But you can't change the rules of reality. One must respect the mathematics!”

“Mathematics hasn't earned _my_ respect,” said Brainstorm. “We just need a power source strong enough to _force_ reality to bend to our will!” He punched the air.

“We're _not_ going to try to harness another quasar,” said Perceptor, folding his arms. 

“Aww-”

_“Or_ a pulsar, _or_ a supernova, or _five_ supernovae,” said Perceptor. 

While they talked, Soundwave touched the points of light. Each produced a window of descriptive, scrolling data. He pushed the node for dimension 0001. He contrasted its data to that of his own dimension. Their differences were stark.

_must acquire all data_

Soundwave glanced at the inputs for the consoles. They were identical to those he had seen elsewhere on the ship. The _Lost Light_ had universal inputs. This was helpful. When Soundwave was able to make adaptors, he would be able to plug in anywhere. He added this tidbit to his formulating plan. Soundwave looked around the lab, taking note of the vents in the ceiling, wondering how guarded the lab would be after hours. He could sneak in and grab the data then.

The image of Ultra Magnus's data pad flashed through his mind.

Soundwave was struck by an alternative, one he never would have thought would work on the _Nemesis._ But the Autobots were shockingly forthcoming about their resources.

Maybe Soundwave didn't have to _steal_ data. Maybe he could just _ask_ for it.

“Is this data available remotely?” Soundwave interrupted.

“-with the- oh! Of course!” Brainstorm excitedly pushed buttons at a console. It ejected a slim card. He handed it to Soundwave. “Here's the access info for our database. You can get to it by joining the ship's intranet.”

“It's a read-only access, of course,” said Perceptor dryly. His gaze flickered over Soundwave's Decepticon badges. “Although if you have something to contribute, do let us know. We will be happy to discuss it.”

Soundwave tucked the card away for later inspection. Perceptor and Brainstorm conversed a while longer on the mathematical repercussions of their current experiments. Soundwave recorded the conversation, but didn't pay it much heed. He made a checklist of tasks and initiated an organizational protocol to parse all the data he had acquired.

After a time, he realized Perceptor and Brainstorm were staring at him. Their conversation seemed to have come to a natural close. Soundwave headed for the door.

“Uh. Bye to you, too!” called Brainstorm.

_“Hmm,”_ said Perceptor.

~~

Ultra Magnus brought Soundwave to his room. “Your probation period requires you to have an escort when roaming the ship. I have other duties I must attend to. You are to remain here until tomorrow morning.” He pointed to a newly-installed camera opposite Soundwave's door. “Normally we don't do this kind of thing, but your violent outburst has necessitated extra precaution.”

Soundwave entered his room without a word.

Being left to his own devices was exactly what he wanted right now.

He waited until Ultra Magnus's steps had faded down the hallway. He faced the peeled walls of his hab suite. “Laserbeak.” The drone detached from his chest and fired precision laser blasts at the wall. Soundwave dug his tentacles in, cataloging the colorful wires and insulated cords and thick utility lines pulsing with energy. 

There was so much to do.

~~


	7. Infiltration

Soundwave's first order of business was to make connecting to the ship as easy, fast, and painless as possible. While Laserbeak continued its work cutting through the walls, Soundwave physically injected his tendrils into several wires before he found what he was looking for: the data net sending information from the camera outside his door to its destination. He overrode its security features easily. Just before he tested looping its footage, he paused.

Ultra Magnus had indicated that they had increased the security around Soundwave. That might include data precautions, as well.

Soundwave did a very, very thorough check of the supportive systems in the camera's data net.

_There._

Beneath and semi-intwined with the _Lost Light_ -typical data structures was _another_ type. It had an accent of its own. Soundwave hypothesized that this surveillance program belonged to a mech who had come from a non-0001 dimension, just as he had.

_futile attempt, autobots_

Soundwave pondered the data as it washed through his processor. He had two choices. One, he could dismantle the entire data net and rewrite it in his _own_ accent, which no one on the ship would recognize. Or two, he could approach the data net in its native accent, like a parasite burrowing in and cloaking itself with the host's own frame. Each choice had its own positives and negatives. The first would give him greater control and allow him to infiltrate the entire ship more quickly. But it was certain his programs would be identified, and Soundwave did not know the probability that someone aboard would be able to decode it. The second choice would take longer to implement, but be more difficult for the Autobots to detect.

Soundwave removed his tendrils from the wire and partitioned his thoughts, letting a portion of his processor mull over the choices. He pulled out the slim card Brainstorm had given him. He turned it in his tendrils. It was smooth, gray, and had no identifying marks. He wasn't sure how to interact with it. Soundwave laid it on his desk, next to Aquafend's gun.

Soundwave had inspected the gun last night, gingerly pressing all the buttons and observing what happened. He had quickly found the power up/down button sequence. He had resisted the urge to tear it apart. That was a task best suited for another. And he knew exactly who.

Soundwave was not an inventor, per se. He could not easily put together a weapon using spare parts, an old power cell, and his own expertise. But he _could_ follow directions. If he could find instructions for building what he wanted, he would eventually accomplish the task. An inventor could make something new and exciting by drawing inspiration from the very air. Soundwave could make something functional and useful by drawing knowledge from processes.

But it would be more efficient if he could delegate the construction tasks to another.

Soundwave checked the results of his calculations.

_Option One: probability of self-generated programs being identified within three days: 84%. Probability someone aboard can decode: 99.8%_

A flash of surprise went through Soundwave. He quickly initiated his emotion-suppressing protocols.

_99.8%?_

Soundwave removed the partition in his processor and sank into his own thoughts. The medical file of an Autobot named _Mirage_ popped up. Soundwave did not recognize him. He had not seen him in the halls or common areas yet.

_Mirage: dimension 2938. Found in state of starvation with heavy-fuel poisoning. Location: military shuttle within 2938-Cybertron's solar system. Displays same outlier properties as 0001-Mirage._

That short biography was followed by the medical examination Mirage had been given, its results, and other various biometrics. Mirage had evidently been separated from his fellow Autobots, starved, and tried in vain to filter his shuttle's fuel into potable energon. Swaths of his entry were missing, notably those whose surrounding context hinted at whatever his position had been during the war.

_outlier properties?_

The definition of “outlier” and what its properties could be were unknown to Soundwave. 0001-Mirage's “properties” weren't listed anywhere. Soundwave filed “outlier” away with a flag. If he happened to come across the word again in the future, it would draw his attention.

Soundwave overlaid the accent of the foreign data net with Mirage's biometric data. They seemed to match up. His processor had noted this and concluded that Mirage was most likely the one who had provided the expertise and underlying programming for the camera's network. Perhaps his wartime function had been communications or security.

Soundwave took careful note of that and moved on.

_select: option two_

He would have to become more intimately familiar with the _Lost Light_ 's programming. Soundwave spent several hours painfully jabbing his tendrils into different wires, taking data samples and building a database. He spent another few hours comparing and contrasting everything he had observed so far- how mechs spoke, how their fields felt, the mysterious energy of the _Lost Light_ , how Perceptor organized his discoveries, and so forth.

His processor ached by the time he had finished his preliminary evaluation. Soundwave took an unhappy slurp from his energon container. It was disgusting and painful, but it illuminated his fading biolights. After his line filters had done the best they could, the ache in his processor eased.

Soundwave paused a few minutes to sit calmly, letting the quiet of the room still his active mind. His processor unraveled complex, long-unused protocols. A shiver of anticipation went through him. Soundwave clamped down on it, running his emotion-suppressors once again.

Briefly, Ambulon came to mind, and Soundwave resolved to see him tomorrow about having his emotion-suppressing protocols properly reinstalled.

As his cool, emotionless interior was restored, Soundwave dialed his processing capacities up to full power. Laserbeak faltered slightly in its blasting of the walls, recalibrating itself to Soundwave's output.

Soundwave surveyed the guts of the _Lost Light_ spilling into his room. He picked a thin, green wire and jabbed all ten tendrils directly into it.

A blast of white went through his processor, temporarily numbing his senses. Soundwave dove into the information stream, covering his tracks with data in the _Lost Light's_ own language. He identified the security camera immediately and accessed its output.

Now he was looking at his own hab suite's door.

Soundwave evaluated the security camera's pulses and notifications. Once properly identified, he echoed them in his protocols. His helm jerked as the entire ship's security system illuminated and expanded outward from him, like a thousand tentacles of light.

Now he was looking through _every_ camera.

It took a split second for Soundwave to readjust to the sensation of having countless eyes. It had been _so long_ since he had done this on the _Nemesis._ It was like stretching a limb that had been curled for millions of years. With another pulse through the system, thousands of sounds filled his audials. If he could have, Soundwave would have reveled in joy right there, clicking his winglets together and sending Laserbeak to spiral around the ceiling in celebration.

Instead, he did an evaluation of the locations, numbers, and types of cameras now available to him.

The first thing he noticed was how _few_ cameras there really were. Unlike the _Nemesis,_ there weren't _any_ cameras in mechs' private quarters and very few cameras in the habitation hallways overall. The Autobots were, it seemed, much more _trusting_ than the Decepticons had been. There were a smattering of cameras in the public spaces, eateries, and bars. 

Soundwave checked the hallway Megatron's quarters were in. He was not there. Soundwave found him on the bridge, talking to Ultra Magnus. They were discussing the ramifications of the use of a simile in, Soundwave assumed, some kind of Autobot rule book. Rodimus sat in his captain's chair sideways, his legs dangling over the armrest. He was tossing little cubes of energon at Blaster. Blaster was lobbing them back. Mainframe sat at his station narrating the interaction like a documentary. Rewind leaned against Mainframe's chair, tilting his head towards Rodimus, his tiny, built-in camera lens zooming in and out.

Some of the _Lost Light's_ camera clusters had additional security, which Soundwave bypassed easily. They centered around the engine room, the supply/cargo bays, the shuttles, the oil reservoir, and the monitoring stations on the outside of the ship. The cameras in the engine room had distorted views. Soundwave guessed the cameras were encased in some kind of protective glass. There was also a camera in a large room adjacent to the engine room, which served no purpose Soundwave could ascertain. Its floor was scarred with colorful paint and tread marks. 

Most importantly, there were a decent amount of cameras in the med bay. Soundwave concentrated on these, flicking back and forth between them all. There were four views of the main area, one camera in each of the private/quarantine areas, and two in the secret room. These had the worst video quality. The room was fuzzy and staticky, but the columns of energon were recognizable enough. 

Soundwave watched the med bay for the rest of the day. He found a rather glaring blind spot in the cameras' field of view. He identified mechs as they came and went. Ratchet pulled broken glass out of Hound's chest, Velocity poked and prodded at vats of bubbling metal, and Ambulon cleaned and organized the equipment. Cyclonus came in to have his in-frame guns oiled. Chromedome had an appointment for maintenance of his hands. Toaster was given a thorough cleaning and reminded that he was _not_ to put plastics in his slots. First Aid stopped by with refreshments for everyone. They had a quick meeting on the highlights of the day and tomorrow's plans. As there were no patients doing an overnight stay, the lights were dimmed. The little diagnostic drones were sent to their cubbies. Each medic wiped down their instruments and tidied their work areas. The doors were closed and everyone headed off to their own hab suites. 

Soundwave waited a few minutes more.

The med bay was silent, calm.

Soundwave sent a pulse through the camera. He wasn't sure if it would work- cameras were not traditionally able to _export_ information- but it worked well enough.

One of the little medical drones wobbled. 

Soundwave sent another pulse.

The medical drone detached from its dock and began a sentry patrol around the med bay. Once it crossed into the blind spot, Soundwave modified the security cameras' recordings. They would show that the little drone had flown along its usual track and then disappeared without a trace.

In reality, it stole items from the medical stock and exited the med bay. As it floated down the halls, Soundwave erased its presence from the cameras' feeds. Once it got close enough, Soundwave removed his tendrils from the wire. The hundreds of eyes in his processor went dark. Soundwave took a moment to let his frame and processor equilibrate.

He checked on Laserbeak. It had successfully blasted precise holes through the hab suite wall and into its neighbor, then through that one's walls again into the next room down. Soundwave exited his own room and stood in the hall, antennae twitching.

Megatron had _indeed_ handed him a strategic location. One of the benefits to being the only mech living in this hallway was that Soundwave had access to all its quarters. He reset the key code to each door on his side of the hall with a master password and busted into the rooms. This granted Laserbeak much greater maneuverability. It made its precision cuts much faster. Soundwave followed it from room to room, peeling back the walls, bunching together specific cords and wires. He checked each room's recharge station. They were all dusty or dented, but seemed to be in working condition. Soundwave carefully bound their leads together, trailing them back towards his own room.

By the time the medical drone arrived, all the hab suites had been opened into one long, jagged room parallel to the hallway, but with their individual electrical/communications/plumbing lines intact. Soundwave was careful to make sure the outside doors to the hab suites did not betray any of the changes within. He briefly thought of modifying the rooms so that if someone intruded, they would revert back to normal, but that would take too much time to set up. He was confident no one would come snooping around, anyway. There would be no need for them to.

The room at the far end of the hall was left untouched and separate from its neighbors. He had other plans for it.

The medical drone's little wings fluttered. Soundwave took it in his tendrils and went back to his main room. He sat at his desk. The air currents had changed. The very slight breeze coming down from the vent above him had been replaced by a horizontal current. It flowed in from the new length of the room, bringing with it the smell of laser-burnt metal and scorched oil. Soundwave shifted his plating minutely, taking note of the changes.

The drone beeped at him again. He directed his focus on it. “Display all protocols.”

The drone extended a flexible wire and plugged into the desk's cracked monitor. It displayed data describing the drone's functions. Soundwave memorized it all. While he watched, he traced every seam of the drone with his tendrils. A 3D wireframe of it materialized in his processor. After a short time, he had a good understanding of how it worked and what its limitations were.

Soundwave sent a command to the drone. The drone opened its compartments and removed tools. It surveyed Aquafend's gun and got to work neatly dismantling it. It set aside the power core and concentrated on the support rings in the barrel. The drone beeped and whirred, cutting and shaping the rings and writing circuitry in metal ink on their inside surfaces.

Soundwave extended his tendrils for the drone to evaluate. It measured them with a laser. The drone methodically constructed ten identical objects. They were short tubes filled with translation/capacitor-capable information filters. They were open at one end and had a connector for the _Lost Light's_ universal inputs at the other. Soundwave pressed one tendril into each object, like prosthetic fingertips. He wiggled his tendrils. The adaptors weren't as fine and light as Soundwave had wanted, but he understood that a medical drone was no substitute for an actual medical engineer. It did the best it could with its limited abilities.

Soundwave sent the drone another command. It floated over to the berth's charging station. Soundwave jammed his newly-adorned tendrils into the _Lost Light's_ guts. He found a few universal inputs and connected. A jolt went through his tendrils as the adaptors equilibrated. Soundwave hastily refocused his own processor to better accommodate the adaptors. After another moment, he settled into the data stream.

The eyes of the _Lost Light_ were his again, but this time, quickly and painlessly. Soundwave did a check of the med bay's cameras. Everything looked normal. He skipped around the ship, noting which mechs were where. He caught sight of Mirage, sitting at the back of Swerve's bar with Hound. The audio wasn't clear enough for Soundwave to make out what they were saying. He could expend energy to figure it out, but he did not care. Hound had a patch on his chest. He touched Mirage's arm. Mirage pulled away from him. Soundwave couldn't see any particular security- or communications-based modifications on Mirage's frame. He was most likely a ground vehicle, given the wheels. Soundwave moved on.

Rodimus and Drift were walking together down the hallway that housed Drift's hab suite. They were laughing. Ratchet poked his head out Drift's door and yelled at them. They laughed harder. Drift waved goodbye and ducked into his suite. Rodimus gave a little wave and walked away, his yellow spoiler slumping.

Tailgate burst out the cafeteria door holding an enormous bucket labeled _Candy_. His visor was staticky with excitement. Cyclonus exited more furtively behind him, glancing around. He held a six-pack of engex in one hand. With the other, he took Tailgate's hand and they rushed down the hall.

Nautica and Riptide were in the engine room. Nautica was standing on Riptide's shoulders, whacking a bolt with a wrench. **_Bang! Bang!_** Little flakes of rust floated downwards. Riptide caught them on his tongue. Soundwave surveyed the room with interest. There were round portals in the floor, irises that would spiral open to let... something... come up into the room from the belly of the ship. The ceiling was a layer of clear glass or plastic, beyond which the blackness of space could be seen. Enormous, rounded red... _things_ fit snugly into the ceiling, extending from the room out into space. Soundwave had no point of reference for them. Their function was absolutely unapparent. Perhaps they were part of Ultra Magnus's dire warning about the engine room. He put the entire assembly on his growing list of things to investigate.

Crosscut, Boss, Chromedome, and Rewind were playing a betting game in one of the recreation areas. Crosscut was making grandiose gestures, Boss looked bored, Chromedome was using his height to peek at Rewind's cards, and Rewind was smacking shanix on the table.

Soundwave checked the bridge. Megatron was there, sitting in his captain's chair, reading a stack of data pads. The evening bridge crew was sparse. Mainframe's seat was vacant. Siren had taken Blaster's place.

Everywhere, mechs were winding down for the late hours. At the moment, it didn't seem like anyone was paying a lot of attention to the _Lost Light._

Soundwave pulled his tendrils from the inputs. His processor quieted, no longer sorting through camera data. That had been a test. The adaptors had survived the infiltration process and given him equal or better clarity than he had experienced when injecting his tendrils directly into the wires.

Soundwave glanced at the medical drone. It was lasering open the top of the bed's recharge station. The isolated power core of the gun sat on the berth, singeing it. Manufactured parts were laid out in rows around it, waiting to be integrated into the station.

Soundwave sent Laserbeak over to the drone and connected the two with a simplified comm line. The drone could direct Laserbeak to use its more powerful laser where needed, freeing the drone up to do its specialized work faster.

With that operation going more efficiently, Soundwave returned his attention to the tangle of wires. Accessing the ship's network of cameras was vital to his ability to control it. But being able to do so without having to plug in was even better. To do _that,_ he had to infiltrate the ship's communication/intranet and related systems.

Soundwave grabbed another set of wires. His tendrils crept along them until finding an input site. He dropped his _Nemesis_ filters and plugged in. Comms rushed through him.

_.:-found another one under the-:.  
-can't imagine how she's going to deal with-  
.:YOU SPIKEWIT I'M GOING TO KILL YOU WHEN YOU GET BACK-:.  
-lol we stole all the candy c'mon it's movie night-  
.:-quill test normal, all quantum energy stable-:.  
-I miss you I miss you I miss you I miss you I miss y-  
.:-false fire alarm in hall 47B-1C-:.  
-made a bet the field chasers couldn't handle it and YOW, THEY COULD NOT-_

Soundwave's processor lurched. The _inanity._ The _Lost Light_ was even worse than the _Nemesis_ had been. Hundreds of whispers flitted through him along public and private comm lines, official/emergency lines, and miscellaneous communications. He was even picking up feedback from some of the cameras stationed near hab suites. On top of _all_ of that was a robust social media system. These Autobots were much more connected than the Decepticons had been. Soundwave had allowed the Decepticon grunts the most primitive connections possible, for his own sanity. The Autobots seemed to have taken cues from humans and were broadcasting the most inconsequential aspects of their puny lives at all times.

Soundwave dissected his _Nemesis_ filter and rebuilt it around the _Lost Light's_ specifications. The whispers settled down. The filter automatically scanned all communications for key words. As conversations were flagged, Soundwave categorized them by speaker, time, location, and key words mentioned. He partitioned his processor and let that task run in the background.

Soundwave turned his focus to the nexus of the communications system. It was a sophisticated piece of hardware and software that allowed for the broadcast of the comms throughout the ship. Soundwave studied it for a time. Amplification and broadcasting had been relatively simple on the _Nemesis._ Interesting, that the Autobots had spent so much time and energy developing this system. Soundwave noticed that it had powerful long-range capabilities. Perhaps this had been done out of necessity. If someone, say Rodimus, wandered off and got himself stuck in a shadowzone, the _Lost Light_ needed to be able to locate him through a tangle of unknown, undefinable, other-dimensional spacetime.

Long-range capabilities weren't currently Soundwave's focus, however. He observed the behemoth system in motion until he could confidently burrow into it disguised. It swept him up in a torrent of data, constantly updating, constantly broadcasting, constantly sweeping the airwaves. Underneath it all was that strange energy he could not define. Soundwave's fingers twitched. His antennae rustled.

The _Lost Light_ was _powerful._

A warning flashed across Soundwave's processor. He relinquished access to the system, pulling his tendrils from the wire. The adaptors sparked. Soundwave needed to connect the two systems he had infiltrated, but he couldn't do it alone.

Or, he _could_ , but he would be at risk of damaging himself. Soundwave needed an external system for stabilization. The _Nemesis_ had been just about the limit of what he could handle on his own. Compared to the _Lost Light,_ it was smaller and had far fewer programs, and far simpler ones, at that. From what Soundwave had been able to decipher, the _Lost Light's_ communication and security systems had been cobbled together over the years. The social media networks appeared to have been in competition with each other before being merged together, poorly. Not to mention, he could freely tap into the _Nemesis_ at any time without the burden of needing to conceal himself.

Soundwave's plan was to use an external power source to support him through connecting the two _Lost Light_ systems. Once that was done, and while plugged in, he should be able to access both security and communications remotely. However, he didn't have enough power in his own frame to access them both remotely and _simultaneously._ That is to say, while walking around, he would be able to either see through all the cameras _or_ hear all the comms at any given time. The _Lost Light_ just had too much going on and that strange background energy didn't help.

This issue would be fixed when Soundwave gained control of the ship and shed its nonessential systems. A deeply reduced crew count would eliminate most of the chatter, anyway.

Soundwave looked down the long hab-suite-inner-hall. The medical drone was finishing up in the furthest room. Laserbeak had landed on the berth, awaiting further instruction. Soundwave laid down, plugging himself into the recharge station using a second set of adaptors the drone had made. He waited patiently, going over the loop he had envisioned.

The medical drone returned. It floated over him and hovered just out of sight, doing some last-minute adjustments. Soundwave commanded Laserbeak to stay in place. The medical drone initiated a sequence.

One by one, the recharge stations in the neighboring hab suites lit up. Their wiring and power conduits had been rerouted to Soundwave's. His antennae crackled with energy as it gathered. The drone perched on Soundwave's chest. It wiggled and beeped at him. He ordered it to settle down next to Laserbeak. With a whine, it obeyed.

Soundwave slipped his tendrils back into the _Lost Light's_ guts and was consumed in data. With a command, Soundwave connected the two systems he had infiltrated: security and communications. His visor flashed. His plating rattled. Laserbeak twitched as it temporarily lost connection to him.

The entirety of the _Lost Light's_ systems lit up inside his processor, layers and layers of systems seething with data. Soundwave shuddered. His processor mapped furiously, following each branching tunnel of information down to its tiniest dead end. His antennae automatically tuned from frequency to frequency, building the map up in three dimensions, adding information to it exponentially.

After a point, Soundwave was able to jump into the recharge station loop he had created. The mapping continued without draining his own processor. He flushed heat from his plating. Whispers crawled through him, filling his audials with hissing static.

Just another few seconds...

The _Lost Light_ snapped into his mind, a fully-formed, intricate map with details down to the millimeter- as many as could be gleaned by the information in _all_ its systems combined. Due to the steadfast cataloging of physical and electrical systems by Ultra Magnus, Soundwave now had a nearly perfect, internal replication of the ship. 

With that established, Soundwave could now access any of its systems remotely. His tendrils and recharge ports disengaged. Soundwave waggled his tendrils. The adaptors were glowing red hot. He shed them onto the berth. As a test, he focused his attention on the cameras in the bridge.

Megatron was writing on a data pad, a hint of a smile on his face.

_success_

The mythological Soundwave had returned. Harnessing the power of the ship, he could see and hear everything.

...nearly everything. The lack of total camera coverage left some things to be desired. But still.

Megatron had told him to _listen._ And now he could. Constantly, from anywhere, at any time.

“Heh heh.”

Soundwave froze. He had just uttered a laugh. A flat, dull laugh that threatened to blossom into full frame cackling. He rebooted his emotion-suppressing protocols again and inserted an appointment into Ambulon's schedule for the next day.

Soundwave needed to relax. He felt jittery. The surge of power had not mixed nicely with his dimensional wooziness. His biolights were lightening to pink. Soundwave flushed air through his frame. He had just undertaken a _monumental_ task and performed admirably. Soundwave wound up his tentacles. He focused on the next steps of his plan to distract himself from his discomfort. There was no need to rush into exploring the intricacies of each system tonight. The jittery feeling soon fizzled into exhaustion.

The medical drone beeped and displayed its energy level. Soundwave plugged it into the recharge station beside him. Laserbeak returned to his chest. Soundwave locked down his connection to the ship- no sense letting anything he said or thought sneak out onto the airwaves. Then, for the first time in thousands of years, he powered down voluntarily into sleep.


	8. Denied

_“-and Soundwave shall stand beside me!”_

That voice was his Megatron's, the last echoes of a dream reverberating in his processor. The sound of fists shattering glass, the smell of blood– already fading. Soundwave stirred. He checked his chronometer. Still quite early in the morning. What had woken him?

_beep beep beep beep beep_

Soundwave shook his helm. Laserbeak was operating correctly. His own frame reported no errors. He glanced around.

_beep beep beep_

The medical drone. In his sleep, Soundwave had curled a tentacle around it. Its winglets fluttered against him as it tried to wriggle free. Soundwave retracted the tentacle. The drone rose into the air. Soundwave pointed at the desk. “Begin next task.” It flew over and busied itself welding piping together and writing circuitry.

Soundwave stood and flexed his plating. Though the recharge station had proved an adequate power source for processing purposes, it wasn't an energon substitute. It didn't engage with his frame the way the stations in his dimension did. No two-hour energy jolt here, just the dimensional unease crawling through his lines. Laserbeak was similarly unable to charge. Soundwave forced himself to take a tendril sip of energon from the canister Ambulon had given him. It was disgusting. Soundwave snapped his tentacles down the new lengths of his room. They were much longer than mechs tended to guess they'd be. Their purple rings undulated his distaste in the distant semi-darkness. 

The recharge stations made a collective clunking sound and powered down. The station in his original room commenced furtively siphoning energy from the ship and charging the others. In a few hours they'd be ready to power up another loop, should Soundwave need it.

The part of his processor that worked through sleep, instead of foolishly wasting resources on dreams, had worked out today's plan. It was laid out before him in a neat checklist, with branching backup plans, in case anything untoward happened. He had found the key to this particular part of the plan buried in Ultra Magnus's fastidious guidelines on food inspection.

Soundwave interrupted the medical drone's work briefly, demanding it show him how to use Brainstorm's card. The drone plugged into the desk monitor and displayed a video, “Data Cards And How To Use Them.” 

Soundwave watched as a mech inserted the card into a slot in her helm. Her eyes went white. Data ghosted over her face. From what Soundwave could gather, the card stored data that was only accessible by means of readers built into the helms of 0001 mechs. Readers which he lacked. He picked up the card in his tendrils, turning it. It was smooth and featureless. Silent, to his audials.

The drone gently took the card and slid it into the desk. A long access code blinked on the monitor. Soundwave seized it. After a split second on the ship's intranet, he gained access to Perceptor's library of dimensional data.

There was a _lot_ of it. Energy readouts, mathematical models, sample scans. Soundwave spent a few hours combing through it, copying information into his desk. The desk didn't have a holographic projector built in, so he was unable to recreate the multiverse dome in three dimensions. It remained flat on the monitor, thousands and thousands of dots pressed against each other, each unique, each identified by a series of numbers and characteristics.

“Beep!”

The drone had finished its task. Using Ambulon's energon canister as a model, it had shaped debris and piping from the rooms. Soundwave picked one up with his tendrils. He pushed the single button on its side. The top of the canister opened. He pushed the button again. The top slid closed. Simple. But that's all it needed to be.

Soundwave peeked around the ship through the cameras. Mechs with early shifts were sleepily heading towards the cafeteria for breakfast. Soundwave's next target was already there, gleefully scooping handfuls of cubes onto his plate. Even for this dimension, he had a strange frame. Tall, pointy, properly noseless. He would've made a good Decepticon. 

Soundwave checked the time. Once the drone delivered the canisters to the appropriate location, the next phase of the plan would commence. Soundwave plugged into the recharge station. The sights and sounds of the ship raced through him. He reviewed his repertoire of voice samples...

~~

_.:Riptide:._

Riptide's head jerked up. The cafeteria was noisy, full of mechs cramming down breakfast and tittering over the latest gossip. His table companions, Nautica and Blaster, glanced at him. Riptide looked back and forth frantically. “Who said that!”

Nautica's hand paused, a small blue cube halfway to her mouth. “Who said what?”

“I heard a voice!”

“In your head?”

“Yeah!”

Nautica rolled her eyes. “Is it your comm?” She shoved the cube in her mouth. She gave Blaster a thumb's up. “These are great.”

Blaster dropped his suspicious look and dug into his plate of multicolored cubes.

“Oh yeah! _Comms.”_ Riptide grinned. He screwed his eyes shut and concentrated. .:Hello?:.

.:You are late with the next sample:.

.:Perceptor?:.

.:Confirmative:.

.:But I did it last night!:.

.:More samples are needed. Report to the oil reservoir immediately:.

“Uuugh.” Riptide pushed his tray away and stood. “I gotta go do the stupid sample thing for Perceptor.”

Blaster nodded. Nautica said, “see ya later!”

Riptide grabbed a cube from his tray and shoved it in his mouth. He strutted down the hall, waving to his fellow mechs as they stumbled blearily to the cafeteria. 

.:Riptide:.

.:Whaaaaaaat?:.

.:You are not heading toward the oil reservoir:.

Riptide stopped. He glanced around. .:How do you _know_ that?:.

.:Irrelevant. Why are you not going to the oil reservoir?:.

.:I gotta get the sampling stuff! It's in your lab. Duh! I thought _you_ were the smart one:.

.:Sampling materials have been provided for you at the oil reservoir. Go there now:.

.:Okay, okay! Sheesh:.

Riptide backtracked. He waved to Blaster and Nautica. They shook their heads at him. He grinned. He hummed a little as he went. Trailbreaker gave him a fist bump as he passed. First Aid patted his arm. Riptide whistled a tuneless song as he waited for the elevator. The lights at the top turned green. The elevator door opened. Riptide went inside. The elevator door closed.

Riptide made faces at his reflection. He stuck his tongue out at himself. “Ahhhh.” The elevator went _ding!_ as it passed each floor. Its descent slowed gently. It came to a stop. Riptide exited.

“Huh.” Outside the door to the oil reservoir were about a dozen containers. They were different from the kind he had always used. He picked one up. He flipped it upside-down. He flipped it right side up. He scratched his head. .:Perceptor?:.

.:What?:.

.:Are you sure this is right? This doesn't look like the right thing:.

.:It is correct:. 

A simplified diagram of how to operate the container appeared in Riptide's processor: hold container upside-down in energon. Push button. Wait five seconds. Push button again.

.:Ohhh... must be new gen tech. Cool:. Riptide gathered the containers in his arms, waved his foot around to activate the door, and entered.

Riptide really liked the oil reservoir. Even though some scary things had happened in this room in the past, it was a comforting place. The air was thick with the smell of oil. The oil was clean and slick on his plating. This was the only place on the ship where he could transform and get around. He resisted the urge to transform, though. It was too hard to push buttons when you were a boat.

The containers had little claws designed to fit into the grooves of the floor of Riptide's boat mode. Riptide clipped the containers into place. He spun, pleased with the jingling sound they made. He stood under the sanitizing rinse for a few minutes, making sure it ran across all his plating and between his seams. No one liked the thought of Riptide swimming around in the energon unclean, including him. His plating quickly shed the sanitizing fluid.

Now was his favorite part. Riptide ran and dove into the oil. It made a fantastic splash. He cut through it like a knife. Currents and eddies tickled his sides. As his vision went black, he switched on his navigation system. His specialized sensors perked up. It was impossible to see while swimming in oil. But he had sonar! The tank blossomed into a different kind of sight in his mind. He swam downwards, legs kicking, oil streaming across his fins.

The floor of the oil reservoir was fuzzy in his mind's eye. That was because it wasn't really the floor. It was the place where the oil and the energon layers met. Due to their different densities, they did not mix when left undisturbed. The ship's energon reserve was stored under the oil to keep it stable. No one wanted huge amounts of liquid energon sitting around exposed to air for long periods of time. Keeping it under oil was standard practice for ships going long distances. There were pipes at the bottom of the reservoir that let energon out to feed the ship. But if you wanted samples taken anywhere _other than_ right by the pipes, you had to take them from above. And if you wanted samples not contaminated with oil, you sent Riptide to get them.

The fuzzy barrier between oil and energon got closer. As it did, Riptide's eyes picked up faint light. The smell of oil faded, tinged with that of energon. He got closer and closer, his mind filling with fuzz. Riptide poked his hand out, touching the barrier. The energon tingled across his palm.

Slowly, Riptide eased himself across the barrier. The energon glowed weirdly down here. Pink and bright, but with nothing to light up except the bottom of the oil layer. Riptide could almost see it with his eyes closed. Floating around in pure energon felt nice for a little while but wasn't really a great idea. Riptide didn't want to dawdle. Once he was fully submerged in the energon layer, he shook himself. Oil streamed from his frame and floated upwards, joining the mass above him.

Riptide retrieved a container, turned it upside-down, pushed the button, waited, and pushed the button again. It was impossible to tell if it had worked. He trusted Perceptor, though. He repeated the process until all the containers had been filled. For fun, he took a big gulp of energon. Perceptor _had_ made him miss breakfast, after all. It was kind of gross, what with not having been filtered or flavored. In fact, it was downright _nasty._ Why did he do that? He swore he must've done it in the past. He should've learned by now.

Oh well! He stretched his arms upward and kicked. He crossed the barrier. Again, he shook his body, vibrated his plating, letting the faintly-glowing energon slough off and sink. Once he was clear of it and swam upwards, he could feel that the canisters were heavier than before. Success! Perceptor would be pleased. Riptide liked the new canisters. They were easier to use than the old kind.

Riptide's head crested the oil. “Woo!” He shook it back and forth, flinging droplets off his fins. He swam lazily over to the ladder and pulled himself up. He shimmied his plating, letting the oil drain down into the reservoir. Most mechs would have to shower again to get it off, but his plating was specialized for this kind of thing. 

“Beep!”

“Huh?” Riptide looked over. One of Ratchet's medical drones was waving to him. It had a little wagon beside it. “Oh. Hi, Wingy!”

.:Riptide, place the canisters in the wagon. The drone will take care of them:.

.:Are you sure?:. Riptide unclipped the canisters from his plating. .:They might be kinda heavy for the little guy:.

.:Do as instructed:.

.:Okayyyyy... by the way, the new canisters are great!:.

Perceptor said nothing. Riptide thought that was odd. Perceptor always liked to hear when his inventions were improved. But maybe he was having a bad day. He wasn't nearly as friendly or confusing as usual this morning. Riptide loaded up the wagon and gave the drone a pat.

.:All set:. Riptide comm'd.

.:Dismissed:.

.:Are you feeling okay, Perce-:.

.:Are you done yet??:. It was Nautica. 

Riptide grinned. .:Yeah!:. He headed for the door.

.:Get to the engine room. I grabbed you a sweet cube! You're gonna love it:.

.:Nice!:. Riptide strode out of the room, the medical drone already forgotten.

The drone neatened the rows of canisters and covered them with a polycloth. It exited quietly and headed for a different elevator than the one Riptide had taken.

~~

_**bambambam!** _

Soundwave sent the medical drone another set of directions, shoved a timed loop into the surveillance system, and disconnected from the recharge station. The dozens of comms going through his processor quieted, though he could still see through many eyes.

“Hey yo Soundwave!” _**bambam!**_ “I'm your babysitter today. Get your aft up!”

Soundwave glanced through the camera trained on his door. The mech was yellow, red, and white, with a faceplate and blue visor. Soundwave identified him quickly, having picked apart the medical database and rearranged the mechs within by color. These Autobots were so egregiously painted, it was the fastest way to identify them.

That proved to be unnecessary, as the mech banged on the door again and shouted, “get out here! The name's Powerfla- aahh!”

Powerflash stumbled forward as the door slid open, his still-moving, outstretched fist striking Soundwave's chest. “Waugh!” Powerflash jumped back and raised his gun. “No funny stuff, Decepticon! That was an accident! We both saw it! You made me do that!”

Soundwave silently ducked under his doorway. He towered over Powerflash. Slowly, with one arm, he pushed the gun away. His visor flicked up a clip of Rodimus. _“Violence will lead to containment. Do you understand?”_

Powerflash scowled. “Ambulon says you have an appointment and I gotta take you there. No funny business, Soundwave. Aquafend told me all about those,” he waved the gun at Soundwave's torso, _“things_ of yours. You keep those inside!”

_“Insiiiii- **iiiii** \- iide,_” Soundwave repeated, sampling his voice.

Powerflash swore and stomped ahead down the hallway. 

~~

Although Soundwave had specifically made an appointment with Ambulon, Ratchet was also in attendance. Ambulon had insisted that Ratchet was present for reasons Soundwave found weak and dismissible. Soundwave reclined on the med bed, stuffing down his annoyance. There was a holographic diagram of a typical 0001 mech's processor hovering next to him. It looked like a tiny moon, covered in cities and glowing craters.

Ratchet frowned at them both. “And _what_ , exactly, is the problem?”

Soundwave extended a tentacle and jammed it into the medical console. Both medics jumped and protested. The monitor flared to life. It displayed a concise readout of part of Soundwave's processor. Unlike the 0001 diagram, Soundwave's processor splayed like a stack of fans. Pulsing lines and circuitry infiltrated their blades, connecting the fan structures in every direction. Soundwave labeled the image in his native alphabet. The labels duplicated. The duplicates flashed and twisted into the glyphs the _Lost Light_ mechs used. The monitor glitched in places, giving the readout a sinister look.

“I see,” said Ratchet, leaning forward. He circled areas of the processor on the monitor, zooming in, making measurements and disapproving sounds. “Is this what I think it is?”

Ambulon read the translated label. “An _emotion-suppressing_ protocol?! That explains some things.”

“Twenty-three emotion-suppressing protocols,” corrected Soundwave. “Stacked and interwoven. Highly stable. When they function correctly.” A graphical representation of the programs appeared, isolated from his processor. Red arrows pointed to the places where they had disintegrated, symbolically breaking the bonds between blades.

“And... what do you want us to do about this?” asked Ratchet.

“Reinstall the protocols. Damage occurred when I entered the shadowzone. Emotions are unwanted. Delete and reinstall. I will supply clean protocols.”

Ratchet crossed his arms. “That's not the kind of thing we do.”

“Suppressing and deleting parts of the processor? Kind of a war crime,” said Ambulon. “War's over.”

Irritation flashed through Soundwave's lines. “Protocols loop or terminate early. Numerous attempts to defrag and delete have failed. Emotionless status is desired.”

“Nope,” said Ratchet. “Not gonna do it.”

“Why'd you delete them, anyway?” asked Ambulon.

“Necessary for-” 

“HEY.” First Aid burst into the room. _“Hey!_ Where's Wingy!”

_“'Wingy?'”_ asked Ratchet.

“Yeah, you know.” First Aid raised his hands and flapped them. “Wingy. The med drone. The one with the little wingy-wings.”

“They _all_ have little wingy-wings,” said Ambulon.

First Aid scoffed. “Not like Wingy does! Nubby's wings are stunted with a fluted edge and Bob The Second's are decorative. He uses anti-grav propulsion. You should _know that,_ Ambulon.”

Ambulon rolled his eyes. “Forgive me for the lack of _pathologically fastidious_ attention to detail. My First Aid was merely normal in compari-.”

_“I'm_ your First Aid now. And Wingy is supposed to assist me with a procedure today, but he's missing. We gotta find him! He's more high strung than Nubby and Bob The Second. If he's lost he'll become very distressed!”

“First Aid-” Ratchet made an exasperated sound. “He's around. Maybe got stuck in the maintenance closet again. Can you do this later? We have a patient right now.”

“Oh, right.” First Aid's visor flashed as he took in Soundwave for the first time. “Whoa. Is that your brain _up close?_ Er, I mean... sorry, gotta go.” He jogged away shouting, _“Wingy! Wingy?”_

“Where were we?” asked Ratchet. His horribly nosed face had a deeply unamused look.

“Remove my emotion-suppressing protocols,” said Soundwave.

Ratchet narrowed his eyes. “What we don't currently know about your anatomy makes me disinclined to _destroy_ part of it.”

“That part of my processor is malfunctioning,” said Soundwave. “Causing erratic behavior. Unwanted behavior. Abnormal behavior.”

“Hmph,” said Ratchet. He circled and moved data around on the monitor. Figures and graphs popped up. “I'd say it was _restoring_ natural behavior.”

“Negative. Causing abnormal behavior.”

“Hold on,” said Ambulon. He looked at the monitor uneasily. “What's to say that an emotionally-suppressed Soundwave _isn't_ the better option? What if the protocols were installed because his emotional circuitry makes him a danger to himself?” He lowered his voice. “That was done in my dimension. The Decepticons did it, I mean. Used protocols to try to restrain... certain mechs. Autobots used a different method. Maybe these protocols provide stability and functionality.”

“Yes,” said Soundwave.

“No,” said Ratchet. “You need to allow the protocols to fail and terminate. Stop running them.” He poked at one of the graphs. “They're suppressing more than just one sector of your processor. There's an unbelievable amount of activity going on in some parts of your brain, but other parts are completely unresponsive. They're functionally dead, locked up under the protocols. Soundwave, you realize some of these parts comprise memories, right? You're cut off from swaths of your lifetime-”

“Emotion-suppressing protocols must be reinstalled. I am unable to do it. Medical intervention: officially requested.”

“Denied,” said Ratchet. “On the grounds that I believe the installation of the protocols was inhumane. This stinks of wartime modification and we _do not_ perpetuate such mods. Especially _actively repressive protocols_ like this. You will be able to reassess, rebuild, and have a better life once they are gone.”

Soundwave sat up. He turned to Ambulon, but the medic didn't meet his gaze. He was fidgeting and scratching at his own plating. Soundwave stuffed down his irritation. “Medic Ambulon: requested.”

“N- no,” said Ambulon. He winced.

Soundwave's helm swiveled towards the quarantine area. “Medic Velocity: requested.”

“Denied,” said Ratchet.

Soundwave smacked the console with his tentacle. The display of his processor vanished in static. “Medic First Aid: requested!”

“Denied!”

Laserbeak twitched against his chest. Soundwave pushed himself up from the berth. He towered over the medics, tentacle darting through the air. Ratchet glared up at him. Ambulon shook, balling his fists at his sides. Soundwave saw himself through the cameras in the med bay. He stared down at the medics with chilly silence. 

“Soundwave, I know this is hard to hear, but-”

Soundwave turned abruptly and left. He felt the relief in their fields all the way from the door. Soundwave couldn't order them to do what he wanted, but he knew who could. He slid out into the hallway and nearly ran into Powerflash.

The yellow mech scrambled to follow him. “Hey, where are you- aauugh!”

Soundwave wrapped his tentacle around Powerflash and hoisted him up to face level. Powerflash struggled, wrenching his shoulders, kicking his legs. His blue visor flashed yellow. “What the hell!”

Soundwave shook him. In Rodimus's voice, he said, _“Megatron.”_

“Okay! Okay!”

Soundwave dropped Powerflash.

“Augh!” Powerflash rolled and jumped to his feet. Backing away, he hit the comm at his neck. “Powerflash to Ultra Magnus! Soundwave's getting feisty, sir!”

Soundwave twitched.

.:Soundwave is no longer your concern:. answered Ultra Magnus.

Powerflash's biolights blinked. _“What?”_

.:You are dismissed from your position, Powerflash:.

“S- sir?!” Powerflash leveled his gun at Soundwave. “Don't you move! This is strange. Ultra Magnus wouldn't- I gotta get this sorted out.” He tapped his neck again. “Powerflash to Megatron. Soundwave's being weird. Can I shoot him?”

.:Soundwave is not a problem:. answered Megatron. 

_“What?_ Yes, he is. He just grabbed m-”

.:Did he hurt you?:. asked Megatron.

“W- well-” said Powerflash.

.:Did you provoke him?:.

“No!”

After a calculated silence, Megatron sent .:bring him to the bridge. Then you are dismissed for the rest of the day:.

“Yessir.” Powerflash's visor went green. “What the _hell_ was that? That was extremely... weird.”

Soundwave shrugged, the motion comically exaggerated. In Swerve's voice, he said, _“maybe you're going crazy.”_

“Shut up! Megatron never gives mechs evenings off. I'll take you to the stupid bridge. Then I'm going to the bar. I gotta get over there before he changes his mind! Hurry up. And put that horrible wiggling thing away or I _will_ shoot it off.”

~~

Powerflash escorted Soundwave to the bridge door. He activated it and ran for the bar. Soundwave entered, taking in the room with a sweep. He had his own view, plus that through the cameras hidden around the ceiling. A yellow alert went through his processor. He disengaged his attention from the security system of the _Lost Light_ and diverted it instead on its comm systems.

The medical drone had dropped off its payload and was heading out again for its second task. Soundwave sent it a confirmative as he approached Megatron's chair.

“Captain Megatron.” Soundwave bowed.

“Ah, Soundwave. No need to bow.” Megatron glanced from side to side. He caught Rodimus's eye and made a frantic beaconing motion. Rodimus was talking to Mainframe. He shook his head with a grin. “Dammit, Rodimus,” Megatron muttered. “Ah, I must meet with-” he glanced around the bridge, “-with Ultra Magnus in a moment. I cannot linger.” He stared at Ultra Magnus with a burning gaze Soundwave had never seen this Megatron display before.

“Captain: two high priority issues. Can we speak privately?”

“Ah, no,” said Megatron. “No. I think whatever you need to say, you can say it here.”

Soundwave's processor stalled. He glanced around the bridge with many eyes but could not find a reason for Megatron's order. Perhaps there was something greater going on beyond his understanding, which required Megatron's presence on the bridge. Soundwave rethought how to state his issues. “One: communication with Drift. Dissatisfactory.”

Megatron gave him a wry smile. “Did you learn anything?”

“Drift speaks in a code that I do not know. He will not give me the key.”

Megatron frowned at him. “What code?”

“Auras. Fate. Meanings: unknown.”

Megatron gave a sharp laugh. “That's not code. That's just Drift.”

Soundwave puzzled over this. Megatron was aware that Drift was unintelligible? What value did Deadlock bring to the Decepticons, then? After a moment of fruitless speculation, he abandoned the train of thought. It was irrelevant. “Drift claimed Decepticon-”

“Ah, there he is!” Megatron jumped up from his chair and waved frantically. “Ultra Magnus! We're late for our meeting. Let's go!”

“Huh?” Across the room, Ultra Magnus raised an ocular arch.

“Excuse me, Soundwave,” said Megatron, stepping around him. “I must go.”

“Issue two: urgent. Medics unwilling to assist-”

“Dismissed.”

“But, high priority-”

“Dismissed!” Megatron jogged to Ultra Magnus and grabbed his arm. Megatron dragged him into a meeting room. Soundwave followed them. The door slid shut in his face. He stared at them through the window until Megatron pushed a button and the glass darkened. Soundwave stared at his own reflection.

_dismissed?_

A burst of red appeared at his reflection's side. “Tough break.” Rodimus grinned at him. “Though to be honest, if _they_ go in there, _I_ go the other way.”

Soundwave's tentacles clicked in their housing. Without a word, he turned and walked out.

~~

Soundwave stalked very deliberately through the ship, brushing against other mechs' fields and getting in their personal space. He took note of who glared at him, whose eyes widened at him, and who tried nervously to initiate a conversation. All the mechs pulled their fields in abruptly. His experiment continued until Ultra Magnus took him aside and lectured him on the social norms and expectations of their dimension, and that it was rude to impose himself and intimidate others, and that this served as his first warning, and further truancy would lead to disciplinary action. Soundwave recorded the speech, but spent the time deciding how he would tackle the next part of his plan. It would require a _lot_ of very careful focus.

“-and _where_ is Powerflash? You are _not_ to be unescorted outside your room!”

Soundwave displayed a recording of Powerflash. _“I'm going to the bar.”_

_“Hrrmmm...”_ The deeply unamused sound reverberated through Ultra Magnus. Soundwave's antennae twitched. The mech was so annoyed, the sound _echoed_ inside him. Ultra Magnus's frown deepened. He yelled into his comm. “Powerflash!”

.:Aahh! What!:.

“Your location!”

.:Swerve's! Megatron said I could!:.

Ultra Magnus's field flared. “Lying about or fabricating orders from a superior officer is a violation of-”

.:Ask him yourself!:. The comm cut out.

Ultra Magnus gruffly reset his vocalizer. In a calmer tone, he said, “Ultra Magnus to Megatron.”

.:Yes?:.

“Did you dismiss Powerflash from his duties?”

.:I did:.

“I knew he was ly- oh.” Ultra Magnus stared at the floor for a moment. “You _did?”_

.:Yes:.

“Oh.” Ultra Magnus's biolights flashed. _“Why?”_

.:Officer's personal discretion, in accordance to section 58c 4419a:.

“Really? 4419a?”

.:Correct. Dismissed:.

Ultra Magnus blinked as the comm cut out. He stared at Soundwave. For a moment, Soundwave thought he might have misrepresented Megatron's tone and Ultra Magnus was now suspicious of the communication. Perhaps Megatron would have sounded more formal when dismissing his third in command, but the comms Soundwave had intercepted from between the two of them had all contained a familiar undertone-

Unexpectedly, Ultra Magnus smiled. _“He's read the new code for section 58c.”_

~~

Soundwave was escorted back to his room. He did not protest or deviate from his normal behavior. He didn't want Ultra Magnus poking around the hallway. Not that the mech had any reason to. After another short lecture, he departed. Soundwave watched him go through the camera.

Once Ultra Magnus had returned to the bridge, Soundwave exited his room. The camera outside his door looped an empty hallway. Soundwave went to the room at the end of the hall that he had left untouched. 

“Beep!”

The medical drone, or... _Wingy_ , fluttered up from the desk. The canisters Riptide had filled were neatly stacked. Aside them were various other tools, objects, and chemicals Wingy had stolen from the medical and laboratory supply closets. 

Soundwave couldn't remember what he'd been like before the war. He didn't aim to ever find out. Since the medics refused to help him and he couldn't get an audience with Megatron, Soundwave determined he needed to accelerate his plan. Ambulon would be more than motivated to help him afterwards. Soundwave switched between monitoring the _Lost Light's_ security and communication systems as he worked beside Wingy and Laserbeak.

Laserbeak made short work of opening the recharge station. Wingy did a delicate laser dissection of its power cell, very careful not to damage its housing. Soundwave pulled the housing out with his tentacles. Its walls were graded for exposure to the energy of the power cell, which ran on a mixture of energon and an electrical plasma primer. It was the closest thing Soundwave had to a containment vessel. If it broke during the experiment, well, ultimately that would become the Autobots' problem.

Just to be safe, Soundwave ordered his drones to seal off every plumbing and electrical line they could find in the room. Soundwave carried in peeled metal sheets from elsewhere and reinforced the walls. Distance between his experiment and the lifeblood of the ship was very important.

He recalled with perfect clarity what had happened on the _Nemesis._

Soundwave ordered Laserbeak back to him. It settled into place with a click. Using his tentacles, Soundwave opened each canister, save one, and dumped their contents into the containment vessel. The pink energon poured out, its scent sharp and sweet. Wingy beeped faintly, a warning for the presence of raw energon. Soundwave directed it to set out the other ingredients he needed. Wingy had only been able to procure half the supplies needed for a filtering apparatus. Soundwave would have to proceed with raw. He wasn't sure what that would do to the experiment.

Soundwave called up Starscream and Shockwave's dark energon procedures. He had spent part of the previous night going through them step by step, comparing and contrasting the results his former shipmates had found. Using Perceptor's thorough scans on thousands of dimensions' energons, Soundwave mapped various models. 

Soundwave was not a scientist. He would not be able to fix the mixture if it didn't work properly. He would not be able to analyze it like Shockwave or Perceptor could. 

But he could brute force calculate his way into a formula with the highest probability of working.

After a few minutes of modeling, he determined that the variables were too numerous. His processor could calculate them, but not efficiently. He was limited by his own frame's ability to power itself. Soundwave commanded Laserbeak to stay with the containment vessel and Wingy while he retreated to the main room.

Soundwave plugged into his recharge station. It powered up. He disengaged from the _Lost Light's_ security and comm systems. His processor lightened and quieted. With the strength of the ship supporting him, he ran through countless models. It was complex work and he went very carefully. It was like building the database he'd made last night, but the patterns were all foreign to him. Soundwave could dissolve himself into 0001 communications with ease, with a full understanding of what they were and what they represented in the real world. This was not the case with the dark energon calculations. Did that series of digits mean the dark energon would be green instead of purple? Or that it would explode at room temperature? Soundwave had no way to know for sure. But patterns were patterns, and math was math. He approached it like code cracking, like constructed language building, like translation. Match up, make note, assign value, move on. Over and over and over. 

Soundwave's frame hissed. He separated his plating. The process wasn't mentally exhausting, because the ship was giving him basically unlimited power, but his frame had to serve as the heat sink. He waved his tentacles lazily in the air. With their surface-area-to-volume ratio, they were good ways to dispel heat.

At last his processor arrived at a set of instructions he could execute with the components he had available. Soundwave ran the model one hundred times. The dark energon product came out successfully each time.

This was the best work he could do with what he had.

Soundwave returned to the room. He broke the instructions down into easy-to-follow steps and sent them to Wingy. Wingy perked up. It busied itself gathering and sorting ingredients. Laserbeak returned to Soundwave's chest. Soundwave rested while Wingy slowly added elements to the containment vessel.

These Autobots who touched each other constantly, who ate meals together gladly, who rescued weaklings instead of leaving them to die starving and alone. Who had forced Megatron into inaction, who had corrupted Drift beyond competence. Soundwave would strike them in their collective hearts. He would record the weakest of them slaughtered by the strongest and present it to Megatron in all its agonizing misery. And that was just the first part of the plan. The infiltration, well, the Autobots wouldn't be around to see _that,_ not most of them, anyway. But what a thing it will be.

If Soundwave was the kind of mech to express gratitude, he would've thanked Whirl for his gift of revealing the _Lost Light's_ most belligerent members. It hadn't been hard to identify the room that housed Whirl's Punching Things Club. Even with such nebulous coordinates as “bottom of the ship” on a 14 mile long vessel. Soundwave merely had to listen and wait. Mechs began whispering about it around the ship's dinnertime hour. All he would have to do was pick one to follow. A glance through the ship's eyes showed Bluestreak heading down a nearby hallway.

After giving Wingy strict commands to contact him if anything happened, Soundwave headed out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I never really understood why the LL would have an oil reservoir... here's my explanation XD


	9. Whirl's Punching Things Club

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gentle reminders: updates will be sporadic and **violence/bad-things-happening levels are on par with the comic.**
> 
> Also, full transparency, I yanked some of the sentences in this fic from another one of mine. If you'd like to learn more about Whirl's Punching Things Club and why Bluestreak's chest plates are cracked open, check out my fic, “I Had A Dream I Had A Tongue.” It's rated E so it is locked, in accordance to my own comfort level. Enjoy.
> 
> On that note, when this fic hits a higher rating, it will probably be locked. If that bothers you because you read on anonymous, please consider getting an account. They are free. The idea of my M/E-rated works being publicly visible makes me want to curl up and die. Locking those stories is my only way of feeling okay about sharing them, and I do want to share this story.
> 
> [advice about conquering the “curl up and die” feeling is welcome]

Soundwave followed Bluestreak to the belly of the ship, where the hallways were curved and the air was thick with the _Lost Light's_ strange energy. Bluestreak walked a dozen paces ahead, shoulders hunched, doorwings cinched together. His field blared nervousness. Soundwave was not subtle in his following. Bluestreak didn't say anything until he stopped, seemingly at random. Glancing at Soundwave, he whispered, “Tailgate's punchable face.” A section of the wall, carefully cut along preexisting seams, clicked and pulled inwards. Noise spilled into the hallway. Bluestreak darted in. The section was replaced. The hall went silent.

It was a hidden door. Soundwave approached. There, disguised among the seams, was a slot.

“Password?” The voice was familiar. 

Soundwave played a recording of Whirl. _“Tailgate's punchable face.”_

“What the hell?” The slot lit up with red as the mech on the other side pressed his visor to it. “Not _you.”_

_“Not you,”_ repeated Soundwave in Aquafend's own voice.

_“Ughhhhh.”_ The hidden door was wrenched aside. Soundwave ducked and entered. Aquafend had patches on his frame and the glass repair in his visor was still wavy with newness. “I hope you get your skinny aft beat! You're lucky I'm on door duty or I'd do it myself!”

Soundwave feinted at him. Aquafend flinched. Soundwave merged a dozen mechs' laughter he'd copied from various comms. _“Heh **ha ha!** heh ha **hehe!”**_

“Freak!” Aquafend, holding the chunk of wall by a handle soldered to the inside, hefted it back into place.

The air was hot and loud with the clang of metal on metal, shouts and taunts, and thick with fields. Soundwave kicked his noise filters up a notch. A crowd of mechs was gathered around an open space. The arena floor was gouged and crossed with paint marks and energon of every color. Some of the crowd in the front were spattered with blood. Whirl was off to the side, gesticulating at Jackpot. Shanix flowed out of the satchels at Jackpot's waist. His feet were covered in receipts and tickets. 

A yellow warning flashed through Soundwave's processor. He looked up.

There was a camera in the corner of the room, high up, excellently disguised among the dents and dried blood. Soundwave concentrated. The camera's feed came to him, and he saw himself in the middle of a throng of mechs. Soundwave recognized the room now. He had seen it last night, next to the engine room. Whirl's Punching Things Club was under active surveillance.

But surely if Megatron and Rodimus were watching, they would have put an end to it...?

This was the kind of camera feed that was no doubt being watched live. Soundwave turned his visor away from the camera. It was too late to loop empty footage into it now. He would have to conduct himself knowing he was being watched.

Soundwave made his way to the back of the crowd. He could see over most of the mechs' heads. A pair of firetrucks was in the center of the floor. The air around them was cloudy with white powder. Soundwave guessed it was fire suppressant. Hot Spot had looped his fire hose around Inferno's neck. He yanked. Inferno was jerked backwards, clawing at his neck. Hot Spot pulled him closer, steam and powder rising from his frame.

Just as he got within grabbing range, Inferno extended his ladder, slamming Hot Spot back. The length of fire hose slackened. Inferno growled, venting hard. He turned around swinging. Hot Spot blocked the first punch but not the second. He staggered into the crowd. They pushed him back into the arena. He leapt to the side as Inferno came at him again, ladder extended.

“There he is!” Whirl's shout crested the clash of metal. He pushed mechs aside on his way to Soundwave. “Move. _Move, dammit._ Hey! What's your alt mode? You gotta fight someone with the same alt mode.” Whirl clicked his pincers impatiently.

Soundwave displayed a 3D image of his alt mode on his visor. It rotated.

“Hmm.” Whirl's single eye narrowed. “I was wondering what your arms turned into. We don't have anyone like you aboard.” 

“ANNNNNNND HOT SPOT IS DOWN!” screamed Siren. The crowd roared.

Inferno stood triumphantly, pumping his arms, biolights flashing. Hot Spot was on the ground, rubbing his helm. Bluestreak, chest plates open a crack, ran to him and helped him up.

“Yeah, yeah, nice job, angel wings,” said Whirl. He snatched Soundwave's arm in his pincers and dragged him through the crowd to the middle of the floor. “Hey! Who wants to wail on the new guy!”

While the crowd jeered and shouted, Soundwave recorded them. Reticules spun around the faces of 57 mechs. They were cross-indexed with his crew database and identified. Soundwave classified them as _belligerent,_ mechs who fought in direct violation of the most important rule of the ship. They would have to be dealt with specifically. Soundwave calculated the probability that Drift had identified these mechs. 

_0.01%_

“Looks like if you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself!” Whirl lifted his arms. “Welcome to Whirl's Punching Things Club! Tonight we have a special treat! _Soundwave from Dimension X!”_

“I thought _Trailbreaker_ was from Dimension X!” shouted someone in the crowd.

“Shut up!” said Whirl. 

“This better be a better fight than Trailbreaker's!” someone else shouted.

“Shut up!” Whirl turned to Soundwave. “The rules are: no guns and no transforming. Whoever's-”

“And no force fields!” shouted someone in the crowd.

“Yeah, and no force fields,” said Whirl. “Whoever's still standing at the end wins. Oh and also, no killing anyone. This is a _Punching Things Club,_ not a Killing Things Club. We don't want the you-know-whos finding out about it. They'll end it in a nanosecond.” The crowd booed. “Ready?”

Soundwave assumed a defensive position. Reticules centered around Whirl. Soundwave tried to gather biometrics from him, but the size of the crowd and its varying individuals made it difficult to concentrate. Soundwave refocused on the construction of Whirl's frame, extrapolating how he would move in battle.

“FIGHT!!” yelled Siren.

Whirl ran straight at him, laughing. His laugh reminded Soundwave of his Megatron- 

For a split second, another arena materialized around him. The dark-clouded sky stretched overhead. The crowd was so large their screams smeared into an echoing cacophony. The floor was slick beneath his feet and littered with the remains of prisoners. A tall silver mech ran at him, powerful, red eyes keen. This was no prisoner, no disposable. A fellow gladiator, expensive. Meant to be fought and conquered without murder, so they could fight again and again and again. Soundwave braided his tentacles before him defensively: over-under-over-under-over-under, one-over-two, three-over-one, two-over-three. One of his unique, signature moves. One of the things the crowd loved best-

Whirl sprang into the air. Soundwave spun easily out of the way. Whirl smashed into the floor. 

Soundwave debated whether or not to end the fight immediately with a stunning burst of electricity from his tentacles. The crowd whooped and shouted. Whether Autobot or Decepticon, now or millions of years ago, it was a show they wanted. The question was, did Soundwave care enough about what they wanted to give it to them? He had already identified the mechs, which was his sole reason for coming tonight.

Whirl popped up swinging at Soundwave, still laughing. Soundwave blocked the punches with his broad arms. He ducked, spun, and slammed the back of Whirl's legs with the thin edge of his forearm. 

“Augh!” Whirl fell forward. He clicked his pincers together and sprang up again. “You're _quick.”_

Soundwave circled him. He replayed Whirl's _“augh!”_ back at him, followed by a sample of his laughter. The effect was clear. Soundwave was laughing at Whirl with Whirl's own laugh. Some of the crowd laughed along.

_“Hey!_ I don't sound like that!” Whirl ran at him again, eye flashing from yellow to orange with anger. He feinted to one side, spun, and kicked. Soundwave dodged. “Rah!” Whirl punched. Soundwave ducked and kicked for Whirl's head. Whirl grabbed his leg and twisted.

Soundwave twisted gracefully with it. His arms moved in a long, wide arc. He bent his leg, drawing Whirl closer, and grabbed his cockpit guns.

“Whoa!” shouted Whirl. “You haven't even bought me dinner ye-”

Soundwave tilted backwards, kicked, and wrenched his arms simultaneously. Whirl lost his grip and was thrown over Soundwave's back. He hit the floor and rolled. Soundwave shook out his hands. That move was rough on his fingers. Whirl sprang to his feet and charged. Soundwave spun to the side.

“Stop dodging!” yelled Whirl. The crowd shouted in agreement. Whirl windmilled his arms and stomped towards him, cackling.

Soundwave had shed his thick armor long ago in favor of a frame that best suited his needs for war. His hands were now delicate. When it came to situations needing fists, Soundwave had substitutes. 

Soundwave unleashed his tentacles. One looped and curved through the air. Whirl aimed for it. The other went straight for Whirl's torso. 

“Whoa!” Whirl deflected it with the ducted rotor on his forearm. He slammed it to the ground with his opposite pincers. The tentacles rushed at him again. Whirl batted them away, laughing and jumping from side to side. “Is that all you got?” 

Soundwave displayed footage of Whirl smashing to the floor.

Whirl's eye narrowed. He snatched a tentacle and spun his arm. The tentacle wound around his forearm like a rope. Whirl jerked his elbow back. Laserbeak twitched against Soundwave's chest as he stumbled forward. Soundwave crossed his arms over his visor just in time. Whirl headbutted, hard. Soundwave lurched back. Whirl's helm prongs left twin dents in Soundwave's arms.

That strike would have cracked his visor.

The tip of Soundwave's free tentacle whirred like a drill. Whirl cocked his head at the sound. He yanked Soundwave's tentacle again. Pain radiated through Soundwave's chest. His feet screeched across the floor, sparking. Whirl ducked and twisted his shoulders. His rotor smashed into Soundwave's shoulder. Soundwave staggered off-balance. Whirl pulled him closer again. Soundwave's free tentacle jammed itself between Whirl's back and his rotor mast and _drilled._

_“Ahh!”_ Blood spurted from the wound. The crowd roared. Whirl swiveled away from Soundwave, pincers opening in surprise. Soundwave pulled his trapped tentacle free. Whirl jumped back. Both tentacles followed, tips spinning. They dove for him. Whirl laughed as he dodged. The tentacles missed, drilling into the arena floor. Chips of metal sprayed into the crowd. 

Whirl was fast, strong, and chaotic. His behavior needed to be guided into something more predictable. The tentacles ceased their drilling. They twisted around Whirl in helical patterns, winding and unwinding, slithering just out of reach when he swung for them. After a solid fifteen seconds of repetitive helices, Whirl shouted, “come on! This is boring!” He lunged and managed to smack a tentacle to the floor. He pinned it beneath his foot. “Ha! That's what predictability gets y-”

The other tentacle slammed into his windshield. Its four prongs gripped the glass as the tendrils crept out.

Whirl looked down. “Gross!”

A blast of electricity went through the tentacle and into Whirl's chest. His windshield exploded into a cloud of glass shards. Electricity coursed through his frame. His biolights strobed and he sank to his knees, vocalizer frying with static. His arms fell to his sides. His joints shrieked as their oils evaporated. 

Soundwave disengaged his tentacles from Whirl. They undulated in the air around the slumped mech. 

The crowd's screams went dead silent.

Whirl's venting was ragged. Smoke rose from his broken chest. The smell of burning energon filled the room. “Good... show...” He wavered on his knees.

One tentacle prong tapped the side of Whirl's head. He fell over, biolights dimming as he went offline.

“AANNNNNND THE WINNER IS SOUNDWAAAAAAAAAVE!!!” yelled Siren.

The crowd roared. Some mechs screamed about cheating, others defended Soundwave's use of his tentacles. Several mechs rushed onto the floor to attend to Whirl. Jackpot clutched his bag of shanix and sobbed. The overall impression Soundwave got was that Whirl rarely lost.

A piece of broken glass was wedged inside one of his tentacle tips. Soundwave plucked it out and tossed it aside.

_pathetic_

Soundwave let his tentacles waver lazily in front of him as he stepped around the new holes in the floor. Though the crowd sneered and yelled, they parted readily for him. Their fields blended together into a wall of anger. Aquafend swore at him and hefted the door open.

~~

Soundwave paused in the silence of the hallway, letting its cooler air wash over him. He retracted his tentacles and shifted his plating. While his frame dumped heat, he sent an inquiry to Wingy. It responded with a chipper “beep!” Everything was going smoothly on its end.

The ship's odd energy was stronger here than anywhere else. Soundwave's antenna twitched. He switched his focus to the security system and fed the nearby cameras footage of himself returning to his room. In actuality, he followed the energy to an enormous, heavy door further down the hallway. 

He was outside the engine room. Soundwave extended a tentacle and spread its tendrils. He wiggled them into cracks in the door and listened.

There were mechs within. Two of them. He heard them talking to each other, walking across the floor, filling the airwaves with their minute actions and motions. They would need to be disposed of or distracted so he could gain access to the room. Soundwave mulled over his options. He peered through the cameras in there. Because of their distortion, it took a few seconds to identify the mechs. 

Soundwave lifted himself with his tentacles and wedged his frame between the ceiling and the heavy locking mechanisms of the door. He jabbed the nearest lights until they popped out. Glass tinked to the floor. He dulled his biolights as much as he could and pulled up his samples of Perceptor's voice.

.:Brainstorm. Nautica. Report to the lab:.

A flurry of confusion passed over the comm. Soundwave heard their replies through comms and the door.

.:Did you get results for experiment 544D??” asked Brainstorm.

.:We're in the middle of something!” said Nautica.

.:The lab, now:.

Skeptical noises came through the door. Soundwave thought very hard.

_.:Please:._

He cut the comm. 

A moment later, the locking mechanisms spun. The door pulled back and Brainstorm and Nautica walked out. Brainstorm's field shone excitement so far Soundwave felt it. Nautica was less enthusiastic, gripping a wrench and muttering that applied physics wasn't any less valid than theoretical. Her muttering was cut short when glass crunched beneath her feet. They both stopped, glancing at each other. Soundwave spidered in above their heads, unnoticed. He slid into the engine room just as the heavy door shut.

Soundwave jumped down. He identified several vents in the walls he could escape through, matching them to his map. He didn't plan on exiting the same way he had entered. And, of course, he ensured the cameras looped footage clear of his presence.

Soundwave glanced around the room. It wasn't like any engine room he'd ever been in before. There was no core, no fuel tank, and the energy was all wrong. It crawled along his plating and the only word he could describe it with was _unnatural._ The gigantic, rounded red... _things_ were perched up by the clear ceiling, beyond which he could see space. The iris portals in the floor were cinched closed. Soundwave saw that the _things_ matched up to the portals in the floor. If the things were mobile, they could be lowered down to meet the floor, possibly sink deeper beneath it.

Soundwave reviewed his catalog of Ultra Magnus's inspections. There were some encrypted files he hadn't bother to decrypt just yet. He picked a cluster concerning the engine room.

_fuel quills...?_

Soundwave pushed the thought aside. He could puzzle over that later. He was here now. Best to take advantage while he could. He strode over to the first bank of consoles and jammed his tentacles into it. Their secrets unraveled before him in a flood of data. It was a thrilling sensation. This was the second time Soundwave had accessed something so powerful in years, since before he'd been banished to the shadowzone. The feeling was almost overwhelming, almost too much for him. In fact, he must have made a mistake in his interpretation, because the data indicated that this ship operated on _quantum energy-_

Soundwave double checked his calculations.

_quantum!_

He had never experienced anything like it before. The closest he had seen were theoreticals and simulations in Shockwave's lab.

A grinding sound came from the door. Someone was trying to override its locking mechanism from the outside. Soundwave hurriedly embedded a string of code into the consoles' database. By the time the door swung open, he was making his way through vents back to his room. Soundwave noted they were specially insulated, shielded from the quantum energy that would otherwise radiate out of the engine room. When Soundwave got back to Wingy, his code had finished infiltrating the ship's engine systems.

~~

Wingy had completed its task. The containment vessel held a substance that was, as far as Soundwave could determine, dark energon. Soundwave scanned it by all the means he had available to him. Temperature, light output, sound- they all came within 0.8% of the values of the dark energon in his dimension. 

Soundwave had reserved one canister of _Lost Light_ energon for a test. If he had managed to make dark energon, that was good. What he had been aiming for, however, was a catalytic form: a type of dark energon that turned regular energon into more of itself when they came into contact.

Soundwave held the canister as Wingy pipetted dark energon into it. The purple drops branched and spread, darkening the pink. The canister cooled slightly in his tendrils. Within seconds, the full volume of the canister had the sickly glow of dark energon.

“Success.”

There was only one more test Soundwave could do. A very important one. The _Nemesis_ , an unliving thing, had gained sentience when exposed to dark energon. Soundwave needed to make sure that wouldn't happen to the _Lost Light_. It was a ship _far_ too powerful to allow sentience.

Soundwave snatched Wingy from the air and threw it into the containment vessel.

“Beep! Beep! Beep!” The little drone flapped frantically, paddling in the dark energon. Its painted red cross turned black. Its lights changed from green to red. It shuddered. _“Beep. Beep.”_ It launched itself out of the containment vessel and flew erratically, dripping.

Soundwave caught it between two sheets of metal. Its frantic wings and scrabbling arms scraped against the metal. “Beep! Beep!” Wingy wiggled and jerked, struggling to free itself.

But it did not gain sentience. Soundwave sent it messages on all frequencies, just to be sure. Its processing capabilities were unchanged. Its behavior had become more aggressive, but it could not think for itself.

“Success.”

Soundwave pressed the sheets against the little drone, pinning it tightly. Wingy's purpose was fulfilled. Now it was a liability, contaminated with dark energon and memories of its chores. It needed to be disposed of.

The other Decepticons of the _Nemesis_ would have crushed Wingy in their hands, or ripped its winglets off and laughed as it flopped helplessly across the floor, or twisted it in half and thrown it out the airlock.

Such actions were typical of Decepticons, and not incorrect ways to dispose of used equipment. But they belied a need to establish superiority. They belied an inherent weakness that Soundwave never bowed to.

Soundwave didn't need to establish superiority over such an insignificant, tiny piece of scrap. He already knew he was superior. He would dispose of it _properly:_ efficiently, without emotion. Soundwave tossed aside the metal sheets and gripped Wingy in his prongs.

“Beep! Beep! Beep!” The drone flapped its winglets as hard as it could. Its arms strained out to him, as if imploring for help. The dark energon coursing through its small frame burned Soundwave's tendrils. Its lights flickered from red to green to red. 

Soundwave snapped two of his prongs together, puncturing Wingy's outer casing and cracking its primitive processor. “BEE! -eeeeeep...” The wings ceased flapping. The arms went limp. The drone was still and silent. 

Soundwave extricated it from his tentacle and pushed it to the corner of the desk. It lay in the shadows there, broken. A thin trickle of dark energon dripped from it.

All tests had concluded. 

The majority of the crew was resting. It was time to enact part one of his final plan. Soundwave filled several containers with dark energon. He gathered components from one of Wingy's medical kits and, with a glance around the ship's many eyes, headed out again.


	10. Devastation

Soundwave navigated his way to the upper levels, manipulating the _Lost Light's_ security cameras as he went. He avoided the few mechs walking about this late- mostly security sentries, bored out of their minds, comm-ing each other dirty word games. Soundwave passed the hab suite halls, the silent and dark bars, the empty cafeteria. He passed the elevator to the oil reservoir.

Soundwave stopped at the medical bay. The door slid open at his command. The med bay was quiet and warm. Little indicator lights twinkled green in the darkness. Machinery beeped faintly. The quarantine area's metal experiments bubbled beneath thick glass. The motion-sensing lights remained off as Soundwave strolled past the surgical beds and the labs and the three drone cubbies. Two held drones silhouetted with green recharge light. One was dark. 

He stopped at the false wall. It parted for him.

The columns rose, massive, in the quiet night hours. Their disproportionate allotments of energon each held a contorted, mech-shaped shadow. An uneven pink glow illuminated the monitoring equipment. The columns pressurized and depressurized cyclically with faint hisses. The room smelled of energon and fresh soldering. Soundwave approached Spinister's column. He swept the little vials of innermost energon aside with his foot, forming a path to its base. The vials _tinked_ together, bunching against the metallic flowers, falling over onto the hand-written notes.

Spinister was too big to be placed within his column properly kneeling. His knees had been bent and pressed up against the glass. His arms were bound and his frame tilted back so that his eyes remained below the level of the energon. One of his rotors and the tips of his helm were exposed to the air, gray and dull. His paint had burned and puckered in ripples, as if he'd been slashed by a plasma whip.

Soundwave located the access port on the side of the column. Its diameter was just wide enough to admit a needle. Soundwave drew up a syringe of dark energon catalyst and aimed.

_thunk_

Inky darkness torpedoed into the mass of pink energon. It spread in deep purple curlicues. They expanded, faster and faster, fractaling out until they brushed against Spinister. He twitched. His plating shifted, sending waves through the energon. The waves sparked when they collided. Spinister's fingers curled into fists. With a faint _zzzt,_ his biolights flickered on. Their white-dotted red immediately shifted to an intense purple. The grayed tips of his helm and rotor crumbled away. Dark energon bubbled out from the new holes they left.

Soundwave moved on to Misfire, whose wings had been weighted down so they would remain safely below the energon. And then to Nickel, who had been placed in her column kneeling. Her column had the lowest level of energon: the exposed rings of her antennae collapsed as she stirred. Krok, Fulcrum. Crankcase. Soundwave injected each column. One by one, the mechs within succumbed to the dark energon. They shuddered and twitched. Purple energy sizzled through their frames. Their eyes cracked open, shining red light.

Proud Decepticons, once more.

Soundwave carefully stowed away his supplies. He extended a tentacle and infiltrated one of the computer consoles, overwriting the biostats-monitoring software. He set up remote access for the columns' release function. The Decepticons would remain at rest, suspended, until he gave the command for the dark energon to be drained away. 

Soundwave slipped back to his command center. He ran through his lists of _Lost Light_ mechs. One list was much shorter than the other. He shuffled the crew's shift schedule around while he waited for morning. Soundwave sent Laserbeak down to the engine room hallway for one last errand. He ran his emotion-suppressing protocols when glee threatened to rise in his chest.

~~

.:Ambulon, report to Brainstorm and Perceptor's lab immediately:.

.:Ratchet?:. came the confused reply. .:What? Why? Is someone hurt? I'm off-duty. It's First Aid's-:.

_.:Now:._

.:Yeesh, okay, okay!:.

Through the cameras, Soundwave watched the door to Ambulon's quarters slide open. He exited and took off in the direction of the lab. He, Brainstorm, Perceptor, and a few other mechs were corralled into safe rooms with barking orders. These were the mechs intrinsic to the _Lost Light's_ functionality and upkeep.

Ambulon would arrive in approximately one minute and thirteen seconds. That was just enough time for all of Whirl's punching mechs to reach their gathering place for an 'emergency meeting.' That left the weakest mechs wandering off to breakfast, where their shifts conveniently placed them this morning.

Every mech had been accounted for and given a destination, save two.

If Drift was a Decepticon of _any_ merit, he would recognize the situation once he stumbled into it and finally put those swords to good use. And if not, he would be destroyed.

As for the other... Soundwave walked to Megatron's quarters while monitoring the ship. The morning risers had descended on the cafeteria, grumbling about the schedule. Whirl's punching mechs were gathered in their arena, looking around at each other in sleepy confusion. They had not yet discovered that their only exit was sealed shut. 

Soundwave gave the remote command to the columns to drain their contents and open. Through the camera he watched the Decepticons stand. They shook blackness from their frames and stepped unsteadily out, crushing the tiny gifts that had been left for them. Their biolights intensified. Their motions shuddered and jerked. Misfire's wings rose, snapping free of their weights. Spinister stretched to his full height. Dark energon leaked steadily from Crankcase's open helm. Fulcrum's large, curving panels jutted, their movement impeded by damage. Nickel powered up her frame-mounted weapons. Purple electricity crackled along their frames. They looked around the room with a primitive confusion. Soundwave signaled the false wall to pull aside. He adjusted his camera feeds as he sent them a command:

_.:kill every Autobot you see:._

Spinister roared and punched the air. At that, they surged forward. Glass shattered and alarms shrieked as they bashed their way out of the med bay. They charged down the hall towards the cafeteria. 

The cafeteria door slid open. The airwaves filled with screams. The cafeteria door sealed shut.

Soundwave disabled the _Lost Light's_ internal communication system. The screams went silent. He pushed the camera feeds to the side of his processor and knocked on Megatron's door. He knew Megatron was off-duty this morning because he had changed the schedule to be so.

“Come in.”

Megatron was sitting at his desk, piled high with data pads. His posture stiffened upon Soundwave's entry. “Soundwave. I wasn't expecting you.”

“Lord Megatron.” Soundwave bowed.

Megatron gave the nose-pinching signal.

“The false title of 'captain' is no longer needed,” Soundwave said.

“What?”

“Decepticons superior. Autobots inferior.” Soundwave's visor displayed the Decepticon symbol. “Under your guidance, victory is imminent. Infiltration, devastation.” The symbol shifted to a wireframe of the _Lost Light_ , which dissolved into an excerpt from _Towards Peace:_

_The Functionist Council understands the power of symbolism and therefore symbols are highly regulated. Symbols are identifying marks: an integral part of the system, revealing the worth of the bearer. But for an individual who chooses his own, the meaning is that of the contents of his spark. What is loved most? What is holy? What is protected at all costs? Will a mech rest his head beside this mark in prayer? If he is so careless as to reveal this symbol to those more powerful, he has assured its destruction._

Megatron's eyes widened. _“What?”_ He shot up out of his chair. “What did you d-”

The air filled with whispers. Snippets of conversations, shouts, laughter, bar glasses clinking. Megatron took a step back. 

“Infiltration, as per your directive,” said Soundwave. He stepped closer to Megatron. His visor cycled through frequencies. Hundreds of voices crescendoed, louder and louder. Megatron's eyes darted. “Highly successful. No frequency dampeners on board. Security and communications systems easily accessed. Weaknesses of ship ascertained and exploited. Commence devastation. Efficient: Decepticons eliminate the weak. The strong eliminate themselves.”

The joyful conversations turned to shrieks as Soundwave switched his display to a live video feed from the cafeteria. Autobots ducked behind upturned tables on one side of the room. Decepticons were on the other, screaming and firing in all directions. They walked on twisted legs, clawing and grabbing nearby Autobots, ripping them apart.

“The Scavengers!” cried Megatron. He stared into Soundwave's visor in horror. “Soundwave, _what have you done!”_

The ship's alert system went off. Red light strobed through the room, accompanied by sirens. Megatron gripped the sides of his helm. 

“In moments the Autobots will be destroyed,” said Soundwave. “The _Lost Light_ is yours. All hail Megatron.”

“Soundwave!” Megatron grabbed Soundwave's shoulders and shook him. “Cease this battle! Command the Scavengers to stand down! _Now!”_

_stand down?_

Soundwave's processor stuttered. His visor flickered. 

_stand down?_

“Decepticons shall rise, Lord Megatron.”

Megatron cursed. He shoved Soundwave aside and ran for the door.

“Lord Megatron!” Soundwave followed, confusion clouding his processor. His frame was not well suited to running. He lagged behind. The _Lost Light's_ strobing red alerts irritated him and he shut the alarm system off. Megatron's footsteps pounded in the eerie silence of the hall. Soundwave strained ahead. As he caught up to Megatron, Grimlock came up alongside them.

_grimlock?_

Soundwave scanned his lists, then the last few minutes of surveillance footage. Grimlock had not reported to Whirl's punching club as directed. He had barreled out of his hab suite when the alarm had gone off.

No matter. Megatron could easily eliminate him.

“Captain!” Grimlock spared Soundwave a glance of the visor. “Are we being attacked? What's going on!”

“Cafeteria,” said Megatron. He grit his teeth. “Grimlock, some old friends have returned. Steel yourself.”

Grimlock's field flashed with confusion. He transformed and rushed ahead, roaring.

“Lord Megatr-”

Megatron growled and took off after Grimlock. Soundwave followed on foot, acutely feeling a lack of fuel, but the _Lost Light's_ halls were too short for him to comfortably transform.

Soundwave stood back a ways when they came to the cafeteria door. It was locked, completely and utterly sealed. Grimlock was alternately bashing it with his head, transforming, and punching it. The door was heavily dented, but stood firm.

Soundwave braced himself for Megatron's conquering blows, but none came. He stood alongside Grimlock, punching the door.

Soundwave's processor reeled, struggling to find an explanation for Megatron's actions. Perhaps his lord wished to dispose of the Autobots himself?

“Grimlock, stand back!” Megatron planted his feet firmly and his eyes went black. 

Soundwave felt an energy radiate from him. It was _dark..._ but it was not dark energon.

Pain came through Megatron's field. Whatever he was doing, it hurt him. Blackness leaked from his eyes. Soundwave's internal reticles spun, jumping, reading, recording. The blackness was speckled with red. It roiled from his eyes. Megatron wrapped it around his arm. Was this a 0001 version of dark energon...???

Megatron pulled back his fist and punched the door. The metal shrieked, buckled, and burst apart. The mysterious energy disappeared and Megatron stumbled forward, spark turning so loudly Soundwave could hear it. Megatron and Grimlock charged inside.

Soundwave hung back by the destroyed door and scanned the room. The Autobots were screaming, hiding behind makeshift barricades. The Decepticons had carved a swath of carnage across the room and now stood in a bunch on the opposite side. It seemed the element of surprise had afforded them many victims at first. Now they fired in random directions, grabbing any Autobot that dared to get too close.

Rodimus was close by, behind a wall of tables and chairs, shouting orders at Ultra Magnus. He and a few of the larger Autobots were gearing up to rush the Decepticons. They shielded themselves from the volley of laser blasts and bullets with tabletops.

“Report!” shouted Megatron. He kneeled down next to Rodimus behind the barrier. “Ugh.” Megatron gripped his middle. Black streaks were burned around his eyes.

“I have no friggin' clue!” said Rodimus. They both ducked as a shot went over their heads. “One second we're all having breakfast and the next, they burst in! We thought they were injured. Some mechs went _up to them_ to help, but-” Rodimus turned away from the chaos to finally look at Megatron. “Your eyes! What- did- did you-!”

Megatron nodded. Before he could answer, Grimlock _howled._ “Misfire! Krok!” Grimlock raged across the room, ignoring the blasts that slammed into his plating. He pushed past Ultra Magnus and grabbed Spinister, wrenching a terrified Swerve from his grasp. Swerve was tossed aside and landed in a heap. Velocity darted out from behind a table to try to grab him. Nickel fired at her. Velocity retreated hastily. Spinister snarled and punched. Grimlock ducked and swung. Spinister fell back. His torso split open. Dark energon spurted from his wound. Grimlock jumped away before it could touch him. Spinister clawed at the ground and pushed himself up again.

“Don't hurt them!” called Rodimus. “They're one of us! Or, some of us!” He shook his head. “Megatron, _what happened to them?!”_

Megatron glared at Soundwave. “Containment first, then answers.” He took the room in with a sweep of the eye. _“Trailbreaker!”_

“Yessir!” Trailbreaker ran over to him, jumping over fallen comrades, wincing away from errant shots.

“I'm going to corral them together. Once they're close enough, put a force field around them! We'll contain them while we work out what to do.”

“Yessir!” 

Trailbreaker and Megatron raced towards the Decepticons.

Soundwave stared.

_megatron... contain?_

Soundwave flipped through his plans. In every scenario he had run, he had never accounted for this: _Megatron stopping his plan._

As a precaution, Soundwave diverted some of his attention to the defense system and disarmed the _Lost Light's_ force field. 

“Help me with her,” came Rodimus's voice. “Hey! Soundwave? Hello?”

Soundwave glanced at him. Rodimus was kneeling, holding Anode. Blue seeped from her mouth. Her eyes were flickering. Laser fire had punctured her torso. Wires spilled out.

“Soundwave?” Rodimus shifted Anode to the crook of his elbow and grabbed Soundwave's arm. “Do you know what's happening here?”

Soundwave's field surged with anger. He wrenched his arm out of Rodimus's grasp.

“Whoa! Your plating is _cold!_ Are you okay?”

Soundwave transformed and flew away from him.

Rodimus fell back from the force of Soundwave's departure. “What the hell, Soundwave!” 

Soundwave hovered near the ceiling over the battle, reticles spinning and jumping from face to face. The Autobots' fields were blaring, private comms sending failed pings. Soundwave strained them out. He tried to aim at the Autobots, but Megatron kept getting in the way.

Grimlock slammed Misfire to the ground, pinning him beneath his foot, howling as if the motion hurt _him_ and not the Decepticon. Misfire clawed at him. Grimlock's field pulsed with sadness as he ground his foot down. Nickel darted between Ultra Magnus's shoulders, biting and stabbing his helm. He flailed for her. She dodged, kicking his face. “Argh!” Ultra Magnus finally managed to grab her and wrenched her off his back. She took a chunk of metal with her. Ultra Magnus threw his arm back, aimed, and launched her at Krok. They crashed to the ground in a tangled heap. Ultra Magnus spared one second to touch the bite marks on his helm before hauling himself over to Megatron's side. Megatron had Fulcrum in a headlock, seemingly oblivious to the desperate kicks and punches he received. Ultra Magnus grabbed Fulcrum's arms. Megatron released him. Ultra Magnus spun and let go. Nickel dove out of the way. Fulcrum slammed into Krok, who was just pushing himself up off the ground. Nickel clambered over the two of them, growling and hissing.

Cyclonus's forearms had separated, revealing frame-mounted guns. He shot at Crankcase's feet, forcing the Decepticon off-balance. In that split second, Cyclonus spun close and hit his chest with the sides of his hands, _crack crack crack!_ Crankcase flailed and stumbled back towards Tailgate, whose punch sent him crashing into the last standing Decepticon, Spinister. He fell backwards onto Nickel. Grimlock tossed Misfire on top of the pile.

The Decepticons moaned, their plating cracking. Then the pile surged, anger blaring in their fields. Electricity crackled across their frames. Cyclonus and Ultra Magnus stepped together, preparing for another round. Tailgate peeked around their legs. Misfire rose. His arms, streaked with dark energon, reached out-

“Now!” yelled Megatron.

Trailbreaker clapped his hands. A force field appeared over the Decepticons. 

_???_

_force field??_

A stunned silence settled over the cafeteria, punctuated by coughs and gasps. Ratchet and Velocity jumped out from behind their barricade, yanking med kits from their subspace compartments.

Soundwave forced his processor from its stupor and ground through scenarios. Should he retaliate? Retreat? Beneath him, the Autobots slowly struggled to their feet, attending to their fallen comrades.

“What the _hell_ just happened?” yelled Ratchet. “Velocity, get First Aid up!” Ratchet tapped his comm link. “Ambulon!” Static came. He swore. “Someone get the comm system operational!”

Velocity gently turned First Aid on his side. “Non-aligning spiral wounds. He was shot mid-transformatio- _ahh!”_

_BAM!_

The Decepticons threw themselves against the force field beside her.

_ZZZT!_

Patterns of squares lit up with the impact. The Decepticons snarled and clawed, but the force field held strong. Velocity grimaced and dragged First Aid further away from it.

Soundwave swung around in an arc. Even with his tentacles and Laserbeak, he could not hope to free the Decepticons while surrounded by so many Autobots. He was unable to determine where the force field had come from and thus could not neutralize it. His plan had failed. If Megatron had not interfered, it would have succeeded. Perhaps Megatron had wanted things done differently. Perhaps Soundwave should have shared his plan, but Megatron had not found time for him. Perhaps-

That line of thought was cut short by a small part of his processor noting that Drift hadn't bothered to show up.

_useless_

Soundwave would regroup in his command center and find a secure way to contact Megatron and-

“SOUNDWAVE!” Megatron shouted. “GET DOWN HERE!”

Soundwave obeyed, as always.

As he transformed and landed, wariness crept into his lines. Megatron's disarming of his plan was _so_ infinitesimally improbable he had not accounted for it. This Megatron had proved himself even less predictable and stable than Soundwave's own. Something deep inside his processor, beneath the logic and the protocols, in a place he never listened to and always blocked out, was warning him that something was not right.

Megatron was covered in blood, venting hard with rage in his eyes. Soundwave would have approved of the sight of it if Megatron didn't seem so angry at him. 

“Soundwave! Explain this!”

Soundwave glanced around the cafeteria. Autobots were staring at him, flashing their biolights, hurt and anger in their fields. The Decepticons gnashed their teeth and beat the force field with their broken fists.

The force field that Megatron had ordered to be put around them. 

“Lord Megatron. I do not understand. I did as you commanded.”

A gasp sounded around the room. Mechs' jaws dropped, staring from Soundwave to Megatron. Rodimus appeared behind Soundwave.

“Megatron wouldn't do that,” Rodimus said, shakily. His frame was streaked with blood. His biolights were flickering.

“Of course not! He's lying!” Megatron pointed at Soundwave. “Do _not_ address me as such! I am your _captain!_ And I _never_ gave orders for this!” 

“You instructed me to listen. I gathered communications for you-”

“I never requested that!” Megatron's eyes flared white. “How _dare_ you bring violence to this ship! I specifically told you the Decepticon movement was disbanded! _I could not have been more clear!”_

Soundwave analyzed these statements. Megatron's behavior was _highly_ over-reactionary, absolutely illogical, and _far_ too slavish to his Autobot charade. Why did he prefer to keep playing the part, when a Decepticon victory had been assured? Why was he denying his own orders so vehemently? Why had he opened the cafeteria door when it had been securely shut? Why had he contained the Decepticon warriors and handed the Autobots victory? Why hadn't he taken advantage of the situation and leveled the room?

Why had Megatron compromised the mission and then _blamed its failure on Soundwave?_

_soundwave, loyal!_

“Soundwave: completing orders as directed-”

_“I gave no such orders!”_

Soundwave's processor descended into a seething, writhing mass of confusion and errors. His frame shuddered. Half-formed answers flitted through him. Branches of logic turned inward, twisting, barreling towards the simplest possible explanation. Soundwave sensed it before it could fully form into words and his frame went cold.

 _There was no charade._

What Megatron had been saying all along should've been taken at face value. The war really was over. The Decepticons really had lost. Megatron was _really an Autobot._

Megatron was angry because Soundwave had endangered his _Autobot crew._

Megatron... was a _traitor._

The conclusion was so absurd and antithetical to Soundwave's entire being, he nearly crashed. His processor sequestered and deleted the conclusion immediately. But it came back louder. It was the only thing that explained all of Megatron's behaviors. Soundwave swayed on his feet. His fingers twitched. His visor filled with static. A flash of pain went through his head. Warnings sprang up, red-flagged and urgent. As Soundwave's processor battled its logistical errors, the room spun. Autobots, horrified and angry, pressed closer and closer. They outnumbered him. They would destroy him for what he had done. And-

And _Megatron would not come to his aid._

Soundwave felt sick. He felt something he had not felt in so long he could not remember its name at first. _Fear._ It gripped his core like a fist, squeezing into his lines. Soundwave's biolights crawled. His tentacles rattled in their housing. Laserbeak fluttered against him. He ran the emotion-suppressing protocols again. And again. And again.

Megatron approached, long angry strides and fierce swinging arms. His field preceded him. It was a wall of rage. “If you want orders, Soundwave, I will give them to you now! I am ordering you, under no uncertain terms, to cease _all_ Decepticon-motivated activities! The war is over, Soundwave! There is no war here! _This is a ship of peace!”_

No Megatron had _ever_ yelled at Soundwave before.

Reality had inverted. Panic welled up in Soundwave's body. He frantically dismissed the warnings overwhelming his processor. Images of his Megatron screaming at Starscream came to him. How Starscream had trembled and cowered. For the first time in his life, Soundwave beheld the memories not with a detached dismissal, but with a growing dread that he would soon understand how Starscream felt.

Megatron stood before him, eyes flashing, fists clenching, field clashing against Soundwave's. Megatron's spark radiated in his chest. The tiny white dots in his biolights shrieked. Soundwave winced. Their piercing sounds played across his visor in rippling graphs.

“Whoa, Megatron,” came Rodimus's voice. “Stand down!”

“The war is over! _Do you understand!”_

“N- no-” Soundwave fractured, as if every circuit was a fault line and they sheared apart under Megatron's rage. One thought struggled to the top of the mire. _protect tentacles. protect laserbeak._ Soundwave hunched into himself, crossing one arm over his chest. 

“Soundwave!” shouted Rodimus. “Back up! Megatron, _stand down!”_

“I said, _'do you understand?!'”_

Soundwave's processor grabbed the only thing that made sense. “Decepticons: superior-”

Megatron _screamed._ Soundwave didn't have time to dodge the punch. He was thrown back into the force field. 

_ZZZZZTT!_

Soundwave slumped to the floor in a heap, electricity crackling up and down his plating. His tentacles couldn't unfurl. Laserbeak went offline. Soundwave tried to push himself up. The floor was slick with blood and drink. He flinched away from Megatron's raised foot. It was pulled out of sight before it could come down. Ultra Magnus and Rodimus were yelling. Soundwave forced himself up, forced himself to crawl away from the force field and its snarling prisoners. His long arms were desperately unsuited to the motion. His fingers ached from bearing his weight.

_megatron hit-_

_but soundwave loyal-_

_megatron hit-_

Soundwave's noise filters failed. On every frequency mechs were crying out-

crying out-  
_crying out-_

spark pulses : _pain! pain! pain! pain!_

_sparks shrieking_

white-stippled biolights splintered 

splintered

s p l i n t e r e d 

i n t o

s o b s

 **> *>/>discordant tangle of throats<\<*<** _[decepticons]_

**_rrrrrrraaaarrrr  
ROARRRRR  
rooARRRRrrr  
raawrrrrrrllllll_ **

a scream _[megatron]_

a long, tortured wail _[megatron]_

that ended in a choking sob _[megatron]_

“Soundwave!” _[rodimus]_

 _ **Warning:** unable to contact Megatron  
**Warning:** unable to locate the _Nemesis _  
**Warning:** processor destabilizing  
**Warning:** chronological destabilization of memory files-  
**\---/Wwwwwaaaaaarrrrning!:** priiiiiiiimaaaaaary teeentaaaaacllle link severed!  
**\---/Warning!:** chest wound!  
**\---/Warning!:** initiate emergeeeeennnnccccyyyy cauuuuterizaaaationnnnnnnnnn-  
**Warning:** emotion-suppression protocols 1 - 14 failing  
**Warning:** emotion-suppression protocols 15 - 23 failing_

Soundwave's shoulder hitched and he collapsed.

_megatron-_

_megatron hit-_

The room blackened. Soundwave crashed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note added June 22, 2020: though I've warned in previous chapters that updates will be sporadic, I just wanted to give another warning here. It's possible I may not be able to update again until Sept or later. Please keep wearing your masks and being safe. Hope to see you again soon. Comments/questions always welcome, and if you need to reach me, my main profile page has ways to contact me. Thank you and take care.


	11. The Coiling Trident

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we depart from TFP canon and enter the realm of headcanon.
> 
> Gosh it's been a while. Thanks for sticking with the story! This chapter is weird. But I promise the next chapter won't take 6 months to finish. Hopefully.
> 
> I'm on twitter now, [@AltraViolet00](https://twitter.com/AltraViolet00). Come yell at/with me about TFP Soundwave.

Blackness.

And then.

Stars, like the spark of Primus struck with an axe, spitting embers across the sky.

Beneath them rose a bloodstained arena. Hundreds of thousands of mechs shouted and jumped up from their seats. Comms were overwhelmed with betting odds. Between the stomping and the shouting, announcers boomed gladiatorial statistics. The air stank of burned spark casings, boiling oil, and blood. 

Suspended between the arena and the starry sky was some pathetic mech, a prisoner or a criminal. He hung in midair by his wrists, arms pulled taut, Soundwave's secondary tentacles gripping him tightly. He begged for his life, though no one but Soundwave could hear him. The huge monitors displayed his face: eyes bright, lips quivering with fear.

Soundwave let him hang there for a few seconds. Once the mech's pleading dropped to whispers, Soundwave drew his long arms back, pushing his chest out. The audience pressed forward to watch. The iris portal in the middle of Soundwave's chest, just beneath his throat and right over his spark, spun open. A tentacle snaked out, clicking its prongs.

Thicker than the other two, Soundwave's primary tentacle undulated before him. Its metal was lighter than that of his frame, a pearlescent sheen courtesy of its power source. It shot upwards, hovering by the prisoner's face. The prisoner kicked and frantically beat his broken wings. The primary tentacle extended its tendrils, sharp and contoured like drill bits, and dove into the prisoner's chest. 

Soundwave focused. The arena dimmed around him. His tendrils spread, seeking the prisoner's line system. They connected instantly. Soundwave plugged into the mech's system like the relay specialists plugged into a communications network. Emotional data rippled back down the tentacle to him: Soundwave felt the fear in the prisoner's spark, the memories of agony and torture that had been the last few days of his life. Soundwave pushed them aside. They were inconsequential. Useless. Merely distractions from his work. Soundwave hovered in those lines, absorbing the way the prisoner's spark spun. Within a nanosecond, he knew the sound of it, the light of it, the energy of it intimately.

Soundwave echoed the prisoner's spark energy inside his own spark. Only for a moment- that's all he needed. Just long enough to understand it. Just long enough to understand how to _undo_ it. 

His spark turned one way, then the other. It produced a specially-tuned pulsing wave and sent it down the tentacle directly into the prisoner's lines. The mech screamed and tugged against his restraints, but Soundwave held him tightly. The primary tentacle's tendrils began their retreat. Even though they were exiting from a dozen holes, Soundwave could still feel the prisoner's line system. It was humming, brightening, _intensifying_ beneath his plating. The mech's inhalations came in gasps, his eyes pleading, struts popping. Patterns of light appeared on his chest. Not running through it, as biolights did, but illuminated so strongly from beneath they were visible on the outside. They spread across his frame, following the pattern of his line system. They glowed brighter and brighter, cutting through the plating, slicing his wretched face, until-

With a final scream, the prisoner split apart in a burst of his own spark light. A thunder crack accompanied it, a haunting sound filtered through the harmonies of the mech's life force. Soundwave flicked his tentacles so the mech's disintegrating arms flew further than they would have on their own. It was a fashionable move. It helped spread the carnage. Blood rained down over Soundwave. Chunks of plating and vital organs fell into the audience. The crowd fought over the spark chamber pieces.

The enormous monitors overhead flashed **Victory: Soundwave!** Slaves, their arms heavy with chains, hurried onto the floor. They swept the remnants of the prisoner away, leaving long, blue streaks in their wakes.

Soundwave shimmied his armor. It was stamped with special nanostructures that helped shed the blood. It streamed in rivulets down his frame. Soundwave's tentacles braided together in celebration. Their biolights were deep blue with the joy of victory. Soundwave caught sight of himself on one of the monitors- even the swirling biolights of his face were blue. He mimed inserting the thin edge of his flattened fingers into his mouth, an obscene gesture. The crowd exploded. Wherever the camera was, it cut away. Soundwave grinned. He kicked a splintered wingtip aside and headed for his platform. He waved to the crowd. They chanted, _“Soundwave! Soundwave!”_ Holograms displayed his name intertwined with other glyphs, forming his sinister epithets: 

_Soundwave The Coiling Trident!_

_Soundwave-He-Who-Shatters-Frames!_

_Soundwave The Bloodless!_

All very apt, though the last one wasn't technically true. Soundwave was wounded so infrequently in battle, he may as well have been bloodless. A medic ran up to seal the only injury he had sustained in nine rounds- a gash across his torso. The motorcycle alt in round four had smuggled a whip into the arena. But no matter. She had been shattered to pieces, like all the rest.

“Aannnnnnnd now what we've all been waiting for- the gladiator round! Tonight's winner claims this year's grand title. The gladiator to face Soundwave issssssssss... _Megatronnnuuusssssss!!”_

The crowd stomped and booed. The medic finished his work and scurried away. Another platform rose up from beneath the arena floor. Megatronus, a tall, heavily-armored silver mech, grinned. 

“Megatronus has bashed his way to second place in the ranking in record time!” shouted the announcer. “Will he dethrone our reigning champion for this year's grand title?”

Megatronus pointed at Soundwave and boomed, “on this night you will submit to me, Soundwave!”

Soundwave _laughed._ So did the crowd. The audacity! “Soundwave: superior!” He flexed his thick plating. Within minutes Soundwave would be receiving his medal, his prize money, and heading back to his glittering cave. He raised his long arms and writhed his tentacles for the crowd. One, two, three: they darted and slid around each other, a deadly, braiding dance.

The crowd cheered. A few holograms flickered on that didn't match the others. _Megatronus Rises, Megatronus The Conquerer,_ and, insultingly incorrect, _Megatronus Superior._

Megatronus's ascension in the ranks hadn't gone unnoticed by Soundwave. Though such things weren't unheard of- Soundwave himself had done it, long ago- Megatronus was an unorthodox fighter. Once, he had ripped out the spark chamber from one prisoner and jammed it into the ballistic arm of another, creating an effective, albeit single-use, gun. Several of his fights had effected rule rewrites, adding specificity to the restrictions. Megatronus utilizing scraps of previously-killed fighters in the following rounds resulted in a tightening of the “no non-frame weapons use” rule.

Still, Soundwave did not worry. He was Soundwave, after all. Unique. Unconquerable. _Superior._

As the platforms brought the two gladiators together, Megatronus said, “would you care to make a wager?” There was a glint in his eyes Soundwave had only seen in his maddest foes.

Soundwave's tentacles flicked with amusement. “State your conditions.”

“If I win, you swear your allegiance to me. I will take you to heights you have never dreamed of,” said Megatronus. “I have _great_ plans, Soundwave. But I can only move forward with you beside me, not opposing me.”

“And when _I_ win?” asked Soundwave. The possibility that he couldn't win made him laugh. His tentacles outlined the shape of Megatronus's silhouette. They wavered for a moment, then pulled apart violently, mimicking the shattering blow Soundwave was famous for. 

Megatronus gave him a nasty smile. _“If_ you win, I will depart the games forever. You can continue beating far inferior foes with no long term goals, wasting your time and your strength on hollow victories that mean nothing.”

“Hah! Wager taken. Savor your defeat,” said Soundwave. One tentacle waved a cheeky goodbye. He assumed an offensive stance.

Megatronus mirrored him.

The monitors above flashed red. A buzzer rang over the arena. _“Fight!”_

Soundwave's tentacles extended and their tendrils danced. They evaluated Megatronus's frame. Data coagulated in his mind: the pressure of Megatronus's feet on the ground, the brightness of his biolights. Qualitative data. No calculations, just the feeling, the _length/breadth/width_ of Megatronus solidifying in Soundwave's processor. Megatronus's mode-lock collar was operational: he, like Soundwave, wouldn't be able to transform. Megatronus had no long-range offensive weapons available to him in robot mode. He was a brute-strength kind of mech.

Megatronus grinned at him.

It was unusual for an opponent not to come rushing at him, but Soundwave _had_ seen this before. The smart ones knew that a battle with Soundwave was best done at proximity. Which was only productive if Soundwave's main offensive and defensive capabilities were nullified. Which was only possible if they were taken out at range. Which was only possible if they were nullified. To fight Soundwave was to fight an ouroboros: impossible and circular, the fight going on and on until the opponent weakened or became distracted enough that Soundwave could destroy them.

Assuming, of course, that he didn't destroy them immediately.

Soundwave broke the standoff. He lunged forward, secondary tentacles darting for Megatronus's arms. One went low, one went high. Megatronus spun out of the way, faster than Soundwave thought he could move. He snatched one of the tentacles. Soundwave wiggled it free and smashed him across the face. Megatronus growled and crouched, digging his claws into the ground.

Soundwave ducked. A piece of the arena floor hurtled over his head. He pulled his primary tentacle out of the way just in time. Its diameter was twice that of the secondary tentacles: it moved a little slower. He waved his secondary tentacles in a mesmerizing pattern as he ran.

Megatronus threw more pieces of the flooring. Soundwave dodged them easily. He struck Megatronus, one, two! on opposite sides of his shoulders. Megatronus spun. He reached out, grabbed a tentacle, and _pulled._ Soundwave let out more of its length, slackening Megatronus's grip. The other tentacle wound around Megatronus's neck. His eyes flared red and he clawed at it. Soundwave darted in close and punched.

Megatronus blocked him. Even clawing at the restraining tentacle, he had managed it. He fell back, putting all his weight on the tentacle, forcing Soundwave to either hold him up or let him go. Soundwave let him fall. He unwound the tentacle, the other preparing to snake around Megatronus's legs, and-

_WHAM!_

Megatronus punched him right in the face. Soundwave flew back, more surprised than damaged. He scrambled upright as the crowd roared. Megatronus was pulling another chunk of the floor up. Soundwave rolled and rolled again, then sprang to his feet.

“Soundwave The Bloodless,” said Megatron. “Heh heh.”

Soundwave glanced down as pain registered faintly in his chest. His patch from earlier had cracked open. Blood trickled from it. It must've been wrenched when he rolled.

“A previous wound,” Soundwave chided. “No accomplishment of yours.” He made a rude hand gesture.

Megatron just laughed and lobbed another chunk of metal at him. Soundwave caught it in a secondary tentacle and whipped it back. Megatronus smashed it with his fist. It exploded into shrapnel. Soundwave sent his tentacles at Megatronus, all three, diving and braiding and weaving. Megatronus blocked most of their blows, though a few managed to get through. Soundwave pressed forward, focused, hunched, fingers curling as he neared.

His foot caught in a jagged hole in the floor. He avoided stumbling, but it cost him the next wave of tentacle assaults. Megatronus launched himself skyward and came down fist first.

Soundwave barely had time to curl his primary tentacle around himself. Megatronus's fist glanced off its curves, but the rest of his body smashed Soundwave into the ground. Soundwave raised his arms automatically, shielding his face.

Megatronus had managed to get himself within range. Few mechs could do it.

Soundwave spent a solid ten seconds blocking punches before he managed to place his secondary tentacles properly. As Megatronus reared back for another punch, a tentacle wrapped around his fist.

“Huh?”

Soundwave's other secondary tentacle wrapped around Megatronus's other wrist. He thrust the mech up and away from himself. Megatronus roared as his arms were forced apart. His feet gouged the arena floor as he tried to run towards Soundwave but was held in place.

Soundwave stood and pulled his shoulders back. The crowd cheered. This scene was familiar to them.

Soundwave's primary tentacle undulated lazily as it neared Megatronus. The long lines running down its length lit up. Not blue, like Soundwave's biolights, but the purplish-white of his spark. Megatronus snarled and redoubled his efforts, plating creaking with the strain. The primary tentacle crossed the remaining short distance with a surge and slammed into Megatronus's chest. Its prongs dug in, anchoring itself, and nanoseconds later its tendrils burrowed inside. Megatronus winced. The tendrils dug and twisted, seeking Megatronus's lines. In the time it took for Megatronus's eyes to widen, they had already infiltrated half his torso. He threw his head back and howled.

Various gladiators, media personalities, interested rich persons, and scientists had asked Soundwave to explain what it was he _did._ They weren't satisfied with his answer, but they were also unwilling to experience it first hand, so Soundwave was disinclined to elucidate beyond the most literal translation of the feeling. They called him _Soundwave_ because there was no word for what he actually was. There was no glyph for what he could _do._

_My spark is linked to my primary tentacle. Its tendrils are my spark-senses-the-world, my ears-become-eyes and eyes-become-ears. Sound is energy. Light is energy. Energy is sound and energy is light. So sound is light and light is sound. My tendrils infiltrate my opponent. I reach inside, I stretch. I find the other mech's light, his energy, his sound. They become **my** light, **my** energy, **my** sound. I change his light, his energy, his sound, and he shatters, torn apart along his lines._

Soundwave concentrated. The real world went dull and fuzzy as his processor shifted its sensory input focus. Megatronus's spark was _very_ strong. Soundwave felt the structure of Megatronus's line system fanning out from his spark chamber and intertwining with his fuel pump. Its branches lit up like the forks of a lightning strike constrained to a mold of his body. 

Being this intimately tied into Megatronus's frame, Soundwave felt his emotions, faint brushes of memory. Not only the intensity of being _inside_ another mech's field, but inside its point of origin. Megatronus's emotional architecture was overwhelmed by _force of will._ Soundwave found himself momentarily dwarfed in its presence. It was a wall, an encompassing desire to rule all he touched and never _be_ ruled.

Soundwave was dimly aware of Megatronus moving his arm in the real world. It blurred, as everything there did when Soundwave prepared his finishing move. Soundwave girded himself and pulsed a wave of light/energy/sound into Megatronus's lines. Megatronus screamed-

The lightning lines suddenly went dark. Energy washed back into Soundwave. He stumbled, shock bright in his field. He hastily nullified the energy barrage before it could hit his spark. His processor spun. What had happened?? 

Soundwave's focus snapped back to the real world. Megatronus had _yanked the primary tentacle out of his chest._ It hung limply in his hand, still gripping a chunk of his own plating in glowing tendrils. A fine webbing of Megatronus's own line system trailed from it, spitting sparks. One of Megatronus's eyes twitched. He bared his teeth. 

The crowd went silent. One of the announcers swore.

_No one had ever escaped Soundwave's final grip before._

“Heh heh heh.” Megatronus ripped his own line webbing free from the primary tentacle and shoved it unceremoniously into the hole in his chest. He dropped the primary tentacle. He didn't break eye contact as he pulled the secondary tentacles from his wrists. He patted his chest. The wounds were so deep, spark light shone through. Megatronus threw his head back and _laughed._

Dread flooded through Soundwave, chilling his lines. Megatronus had _pulled out_ the tentacle that had been _enmeshed with his life force._ Megatronus had been holding back the entire time he had bashed his way up the ranks. He had only used a fraction of his savage might, saving it all up for this fight with Soundwave. A mech who could resist Soundwave's fatal attack _could not be defeated._

The realization stung. Soundwave reeled back, curling his secondary tentacles, whipping them against the arena floor. His primary tentacle did not respond to the pings from his spark. It was powerless, shocked, limp on the floor. Defiant pride rose in his lines. “Soundwave: superior!”

“Your arrogance weakens you!” shouted Megatronus. He darted forward, faster than he had moved in any fight yet, and grabbed Soundwave's secondary tentacles. He bunched them into coils in his hands, forcing Soundwave closer to him. Soundwave pummeled his face and chest, kicked at his knees, his waist. Megatronus didn't even bother blocking him. The blows had no effect.

When Soundwave was within arm's length, Megatronus pulled his tentacles taut. In a fluid motion, he threw Soundwave to the ground and stomped on the coiled tentacles, trapping them beneath his feet. Hands free, he caught Soundwave's forearms.

“Augh!” Soundwave wrenched his frame upwards. Megatronus thudded down on top of him. He bent and shoved Soundwave's long arms under his own knees. Soundwave's primary tentacle finally onlined. It shot up at Megatronus.

Megatronus darted to the side and grabbed it. He gripped it, squeezing and crushing it until it wound up in self defense. Once it was short enough, Megatronus flattened it to Soundwave's chest beneath one hand. He raised the other to the sky.

“Yield!” shouted Megatronus.

“No!”

Megatronus brought his fist down on Soundwave's left eye. It shattered, spewing blue. 

_“Augh!”_ Soundwave's vision halved. The edges of Megatronus's sneering face and the arena above glitched in purple.

Soundwave struggled with all his might. His secondary tentacles wrenched and coiled. He arched his back, kicked his legs, tried to free his arms, but Megatronus was too heavy. 

Megatronus shook wet ocular glass from his hand. He shoved Soundwave's collar plating aside and gripped his throat, crushing its cords. “Yield!”

“No!”

Scraps of serrated metal sprang from Megatronus's fist like knives. He slashed Soundwave's face, severing the biolights in his cheek. They spurted fluid and flickered. Their light went out. _“Augh!!”_ Soundwave had never felt deactivated biolights before. The pain was excruciating, even worse than the broken eye and the tentacles being ground into the arena floor.

“Yield!”

“No!”

“Yield, or you will never fight in this arena again!”

“No!”

“Very well.” Megatronus snarled and gripped the base of the primary tentacle. He squeezed it between his fingers. With a roar, he _ripped it out_ of Soundwave's frame. Soundwave _screamed._

The world went dark at the edges. Time slowed. Spurts of blood and metal shards burst from Soundwave's chest. The trailing wires and lines from the primary tentacle snapped back against Megatronus's arm, leaving a pattern of dashes and dots in blood. Brilliant spark light erupted from the wound. The crowd's roars smeared into a long, low bellow. 

Errors careened through Soundwave's processor. 

**Warning!:** primary tentacle link severed!  
**Warning!:** chest wound!  
**Warning!:** initiate emergency cauterization!

Soundwave did not register the warnings. The processor components that were once linked to his primary tentacle screamed darkness and confusion and silence. The absence of sensory input echoed through him, a wave of nullification, a wave of negation of the self, a wave of _not-Soundwave._

Absent of orders, his processor reverted to emergency prioritization. The tentacle had been rooted into his spark chamber. Now it was ruptured, an entire hemisphere gone. Soundwave's spark was exposed to the elements. The surrounding outer layers of the chamber shuddered, straining to close. The grotesque feeling jolted Soundwave from his stupor. Time sped up again. The arena went bright, too bright, and Soundwave's audials filled with screams and buzzers and Megatronus's voice. Soundwave gasped and heaved, his limbs twitching, chest jutting up and down from the ground.

Megatronus was still holding the severed tentacle. Its lights flickered between his fingers. It was _dying._

“N- no-”

Megatronus threw it to the ground. It writhed, curling around itself, gushing blood and light. Its prongs scratched at the arena floor, the tendrils darting in and out, reaching for Soundwave. His chest ached for it. He reached back with all his might, willing his arms to untangle and his secondary tentacles to throw off their restraints. If he could get it in time, reconnect it, he could save it-

Megatronus idly pushed the tentacle further away. Soundwave heaved his body, kicked, flailed, but Megatronus held him down. The tentacle spasmed. Its tendrils curled one final time and went motionless. The deactivation spread, freezing the prongs in place and dulling the lights, until the entire tentacle went still. 

Megatronus chuckled.

Soundwave fell back and wailed. He threw every severed line into the sound. The arena speakers crescendoed and cracked. The microphones shrieked reverb. The crowd covered their audials. Even Megatronus winced.

Soundwave would have kept going, would have undone each and every mech in the arena, but one critical processor error among the countless managed to grab his attention. His spark was bare, leaking light, vulnerable. Soundwave ceased his audial assault and initiated his emergency cauterization upgrade. His armor simultaneously sprayed the chest wound with a silica compound and swept it with laser light. The wound fused shut under a perfect circle of steaming glass.

It protected his spark, but it destroyed the delicate lines that had run from it to the disembodied tentacle. Soundwave would never be able to reattach it. His spark spun beneath the glass- too loud, too fast. It was still sending light out to lines that were no longer there. The glass glowed like a biolight.

Megatronus grabbed another tentacle and squeezed it meaningfully. “Yield!”

Soundwave shuddered. The most important part of him had just _died._ He could not bear the loss of another tentacle. With rage pulsing from him, he spat, “M- Megatronus: _superior.”_

The crowd roared.

Megatronus smiled. “That wasn't so hard, was it?” He yanked Soundwave up. 

Soundwave stumbled, struggling to place his feet flat on the ground. His limbs initiated resets. The arena spun, a smear of faces and lights. His remaining tentacles wound around each other in patterns that were all wrong, missing their third. The glass in his chest throbbed. The spark light that should've been channeled through his primary tentacle was bouncing around inside his chest, burning and hollow all at once. His entire frame wanted to curl into itself and mourn. 

“I claim victory! And Soundwave shall stand beside me!” Megatronus shook him. “The only mech worthy!”

The crowd erupted in applause. Monitors overhead blared light and alarms. The announcers gleefully proclaimed the end of Soundwave's long reign. Gladiators on the sidelines jumped up to hail Megatronus, schadenfreude loud in their fields. Soundwave had fallen at last. Megatronus had been true to his word. Soundwave could never fight in the arena again. 

Megatronus was saying something. Soundwave struggled to hear him over the din and the pain. Megatronus was waving to the crowd, but talking to Soundwave from the side of his mouth. “Your capabilities are immense. But you've been focusing them in the wrong direction.” Megatronus moved Soundwave like a puppet, pushing their faces together. His eyes were wild. “I have plans, Soundwave. I know _exactly_ what you need to do. Swear allegiance to me and you will _never_ taste defeat again.”

Soundwave forced his mouth to move. The side with the deactivated biolights wasn't responding. “One condition,” he said, vocalizer scratchy and flat. He sealed off the optic wiring to his destroyed eye. The staticky, purple shadows around Megatronus disappeared.

“And that would be?”

Soundwave pointed at his tentacle. “It comes with me. Don't let the scrappers take it.”

Megatronus looked like he was about to laugh at Soundwave's request. Then his eyes brightened. “Indeed, Soundwave. A thought occurs to me... yes. Yes, your appendage will be returned to you. _Improved.”_ Megatronus grabbed it from the arena floor and thrust it at him.

Soundwave's two remaining tentacles coiled around it with longing. They tried to braid with it, but it was frozen in death. Its metal was darkening. “Quickly,” Soundwave said, though he knew there was no hope.

“You!” Megatronus shouted at one of the medics at the side of the arena. “Get that tentacle in energon.”

“Yes, Megatronus.” The medic put his arm around Soundwave's middle. Soundwave didn't have the strength to push him away. He was led off the floor, broken and bleeding, face cast down as anger and humiliation burned through him. His spark sent light out to severed lines again and again. It scattered and swirled away to useless nothingness in his broken chest.

“Look up,” said the medic gently. “It'll pull your collar plating away from the wound. It'll hurt less.”

Soundwave raised his chin. Blood streamed from his broken eye down his cheek: hot as it flowed over living skin, nothing where the biolights had been severed, then hot again. 

As he glared at the sky, the arena faded. The touch of the medic's hands fell away. The stars above brightened. Filaments of light spooled out, connecting them together into a latticework. They vibrated like light, like strings, like the lines in the prisoners he had slaughtered, like the lines that had been ripped from his chest. The sky stretched far and wide. There was nothing but vibrating stars playing notes that were data, plucking at Soundwave's processor, begging to be remembered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The bright, circular biolight(??) on Soundwave's chest always fascinated me. The perfect place for a spark-connected tentacle to extend from. What's creepier than a Soundwave with two tentacles? A Soundwave with three tentacles. Who can reach inside you, Know your being, and send an anti-your-being-wave into you to destroy you. The chapter was a bit abstract at times. I hope it all made sense and you enjoyed <3


	12. The Choice

Soundwave heard before he saw. He heard the faint whir of Laserbeak against his chest. He heard the mechs around him talking, felt their fields float over him, heard the sounds of their lips and their tongues and the energon that pulsed through their lines. If he wasn't careful, he'd hear the electricity in their brains. He heard instruments beeping and pinging. He felt pulses of medicware scanning his frame and, beneath it all, the alien quantum energy of the _Lost Light_. 

He onlined his visor.

Above him were medical monitors, Ratchet's cross face, Velocity biting her lower lip, and Rodimus, whose expression shifted from worried to ecstatic in a split second.

“He's awake!” shouted Rodimus.

Soundwave groaned, dialed his hearing sensitivity down, and reinstated his filters. Everything was too loud, too close. He made a fist and found his arms had been restrained. He looked down. His legs, his chest- all covered in bands of metal and force fields that scattered light. He struggled against them, to no avail. “Release me!” His vocalizer was weak and staticky, pathetic to his own audials.

Ratchet looked at one of the monitors. Velocity quirked an ocular arch. “Can we?” she asked. “I need to check his dorsal spines for damage.”

“Not advised,” said Ratchet. “He's about to run a self-assessment.”

Soundwave found himself doing just that.

_**Initializing self-assessment.**  
**Warning:** restraints detected  
**Warning:** unable to contact Megatron  
**Warning:** unable to locate the _Nemesis_  
**Warning:** unable to connect to geosynchronous satellites  
**Warning:** location unknown  
**Warning:** suppression protocols 1 - 14 failed  
**Warning:** suppression protocols 15 - 23 failed  
**Warning:** suppression protocol reboot failed  
**Warning:** suppression protocol reboot failed  
**Warning:** suppression protocol reboot failed  
**Warning:** suppression protocols fatally corrupted_

The warnings skittered across Soundwave's processor. He dismissed them with irritation. As the warnings faded, his last waking memory was restored, and he went still. Megatron screaming. Autobots bleeding and shouting and then quiet, so quiet. Megatron. Contact. Pain. 

Soundwave's spark, which he hadn't noticed in years, froze in his chest. 

“Er,” said Rodimus, poking at one of the monitors. “Is he broken?”

“No,” said Ratchet. “He's less broken than he's been in millions of years.”

_megatron-_

_lost light-_

_decepticons-_

_megatron-_

“Hey!” said Rodimus. He leaned over and put a hand on Soundwave's shoulder. “It's gonna be okay. Chill out.”

“M-Megatron-” started Soundwave. His vocalizer stung. His vision wavered. _“Decepticons-”_

“The war's over,” said Rodimus. “It's okay, though. You're here! You can stay here and-”

“Decepticons: superior!” Soundwave thrashed in the restraints. The irises to his tentacles opened but they thudded against the force field around his chest. “Autobots: inferior!”

Ratchet shook his head. “He's a one-track mech. I don't know how we can get through to him.”

“Decepticons: superior!”

“Megatron _did_ tell him, right?” asked Velocity.

“A bunch of times, according to him,” said Rodimus. “And then one _last_ time.” He leaned closer to Soundwave. “The war's over, Soundwave. Really. It is. You can keep being loyal to Megatron if you want. That means being loyal to a new cause, one of peaceful discovery and adventure! Or you can just... stop. Your old work is done. You can choose a new path.”

Anger and resentment washed through Soundwave. They were bitterly unwelcome. _“Where is Megatron?”_

Rodimus shifted uneasily. “He doesn't want to see you.”

“Coward!”

“You're a loyal Decepticon, Soundwave,” said Rodimus. “There's nothing that Megatron is more afraid of than going back to that.”

_“Traitor.”_

“I know it's hard to put the war routine behind you, but it's over. You're free of it. _Freedom!_ The sweetest word in the universe! You can be your own mech now,” said Rodimus. 

Anger swirled. Soundwave gripped it. He had used it once, a long time ago. He had forgotten what a venomous fuel it was. His frame gave off hissing static. “I have _always_ been my own mech.” 

“You sure about that?” asked Rodimus. He glanced at Ratchet. “You don't have to take orders from Megatron anymore. I mean, you _do,_ he is co-captain. But... you don't have to _dedicate_ yourself to him anymore. You've spent the last three-to-six million years following his every order. Now you can be your own person.” Rodimus plunked down on a stool next to the medical berth. He laced his fingers together and set his chin on them. “Trust me, Megatron _wants_ you to be your own person. Do you have any hobbies?”

His field washed over Soundwave, positive and calm. Soundwave twitched. 

“Like, uh. I dunno. Collecting little animal friends? Composing music...?” Rodimus looked at Velocity. “What do Soundwaves like?” 

She shrugged. “I've only met four. They weren't in hobby-sharing moods.”

“Soundwaves like murdering Autobots,” muttered Ratchet.

 _“That's_ helpful,” Rodimus said. He jutted his chin at the door. “Can we get some privacy?”

Velocity glanced at Ratchet. His expression soured. They walked out. 

Rodimus slumped forward, elbows on his knees. He dragged his hands down his face. “Ugh. I'm sorry, Soundwave. This is- this is partly my fault. I brought you aboard. I should've been there for you! Megatron couldn't step up so I should've... I should've tried harder. Of _course_ you'd need an adjustment period. Of course you'd be-”

“You're _sorry?”_ Soundwave repeated.

“-lost and- uh. Yeah,” said Rodimus. “I am. It's very mature of me.”

“Pathetic,” spat Soundwave.

Rodimus's face fell. 

_“Pathetic Autobot.”_

Rodimus's gaze flicked to the side. Soundwave followed it. A small vial of pink energon sat on the table next to his medical berth. Soundwave's field pulsed with contempt.

“Do you know what that is?” asked Rodimus.

Soundwave's visor lit up with a graphic of the vial. “A gift of your blood,” he said. “Which is poisonous to me. Idiot Autobot.”

“No,” said Rodimus. “It's a-

“I already _know_ it's poisonous. I will not consume it.”

“Soundwave, it's not poison.” Rodimus put his hand over his spark. “It's a _promise.”_

A big red X went through the graphic on Soundwave's visor. “Your promise of destruction is nullified by-”

“No! Soundwave!” Rodimus clenched his fists. “Shut up for ten seconds so I can humbly apologize!”

Soundwave's visor lit up with symbols.

“Okay, I don't know what all that means, but I'm gonna assume it's not good.” 

_“Inferior_ Autobot-”

“Soundwave! If you let me finish my apology I'll make Megatron come here and talk to you!”

Soundwave's visor flashed red at the mention of Megatron's name.

“Ugh.” Rodimus shook his head. “Soundwave, that is my _innermost energon._ People pay good money for it. But I _gave_ you some because it's a promise. Okay? It's a promise that I'm gonna help you get a new life here. A new life on the _Lost Light_. And it'll be good and you'll be happy and _we'll all be happy_ and you'll stop trying to destroy everything!”

“I reject your promise.”

“You don't get to reject _my_ promise,” said Rodimus.

“I reject the premise of your promise.”

_“What?”_

Footsteps sounded from beyond the door. Soundwave tilted his helm towards it. Rodimus followed. A moment later, Drift stalked through. His plating was scratched and smeared with blood. His fists clenched and unclenched. Drift ignored Rodimus and leaned close to Soundwave. His field was heavy with anger and his lips curled back, revealing sharp teeth.

Soundwave let out a breathy, amused sound. Drift looked like an Autobot doing a terrible impression of a Decepticon. Useless, pathetic Drift.

“Forget the fact that the war is actually over,” said Drift. “Why did you _join it?”_

Soundwave didn't know _what_ he had expected Drift to say. This wasn't in his top ten guesses, given previous interactions. Still, the answer was as clear to Soundwave now as it was on that day. “Megatron: superior.”

“And? That's it? Just physical superiority? He didn't promise you riches, or status, or freedom from an oppressive governing body?”

Soundwave said nothing.

“A planet? A billion organics to crush?”

Soundwave said nothing.

“He didn't even promise you _energon?”_

“Megatron: _superior.”_

“Yeah,” snarled Drift. “But _why?”_

Were the Autobot's audials broken? Soundwave didn't care to repeat himself again. He turned his helm away.

“No.” Drift forced Soundwave's helm back. Soundwave hissed static at him. “Shut up. Every dimension's Decepticon rising had a tiny, _tiny_ seed of good to it. In some dimensions, Megatron calls for the end of corrupt leadership. In others, he calls for an end to slavery. Ends to religious oppression, political oppression, social oppression. Ends to resource limiting and planned famines. _Which one_ was it for you, Soundwave?”

Soundwave's visor lit up with angry red lines. _“Shut up,”_ he repeated in Drift's voice.

“Which tiny, minuscule, _barely-there_ reason did Megatron have to wage war in your dimension?” Drift gripped Soundwave's helm tighter. “Tell me what was worth dedicating your life to, Soundwave!”

Soundwave's visor displayed a video of Drift. _“The Decepticon path is guided by principles of superiority and violence. Negative actions and negative forces, intertwining. Like the harmonies in this crys-”_

“Shut up!” Drift pushed Soundwave's head back, exposing his neck. Soundwave's tentacles thudded against the shielding around his torso. His frame shook. His field pulsed with anger. 

“Whoa, Drift-” started Rodimus.

“If your Megatron is so great, why did Rodimus find you starving and alone?!”

Soundwave's biolights deepened from blue to purple.

“If your Megatron is so great, why didn't he crush the Autobots in the beginning? Why did your war go on for millions of years? If your Megatron is so great, _why are you on this ship right now?”_

Drift's fingertips pushed into his helm, threatening to force their way under his visor. Soundwave heaved his shoulders and kicked, but the shields held firm. Laserbeak sent a warning that its wings were scraping against the light shield. Even so, Soundwave couldn't stop himself from struggling. The smell of burning paint singed the air.

“I'll tell you why. Because he _wasn't._ Because whatever tiny seed of good change he planted grew up into something twisted and wrong, and it twisted you with it. And as soon as you realize that, you can fix it. I joined the Decepticons because our Megatron promised us a better world. We had Functionists, Soundwave. Did you have those?”

Soundwave strained against the light shields. “Release- me-”

Drift squeezed Soundwave's helm. “I said, _'did you have Functionists, Soundwave?'”_

_“Negative.”_

“They're _horrible._ Megatron promised us something better! And we fought. But then we never stopped fighting.”

Soundwave's visor lit up with words. They filled the screen, the glyphs deep blue and shadowed.

Drift's eyes widened. His grip slackened. “That's _Toward's Peace!_ You read it?”

The words kept scrolling.

“But... but the addendum, at the end, didn't you see that?! Where Megatron disbands the Decepticons??”

“False words. Lexicon analyzation did not match his established writing.” Reticules spun around the glyphs. “Obvious Autobot propaganda added to manifesto. Dismissed data.”

Drift stared open-mouthed. “You are the most single-minded mech I have ever met. Do you believe Megatron now??”

 _That_ was the question Soundwave had not yet dared to ask himself. What he knew to be real and what reality claimed to be clashed in his processor. His visor displayed static. Pain pulsed from him, leaking out around the restraints. 

“Stop,” said Rodimus. He grabbed Drift's arm. “With me. Now.” Rodimus pointed a finger at Soundwave. “You. Remember what I told you.” With some difficulty, Rodimus dragged Drift out of the room. 

Soundwave fell back against the medical bed. He hadn't realized how tense his body had coiled against the light shields. His processor, already reeling, had no capacity to understand an unpredictable, hostile Drift. Since waking, his mind had built lucidity on a foundation of denial and anger. It cracked under the weight of Drift's question.

~~

“What are you-” Rodimus glanced around the busy med bay and lowered his voice _“-doing_ in there?”

Drift seethed. One of the med drones flying overhead went out of its way to avoid him. His field spat anger. Rodimus couldn't see his aura, but he guessed it was dark.

“Breathe, mech. Find your center and stuff.” Rodimus tried to do the same. He scrabbled for happy memories, like Drift had taught him, but the smell of blood was distracting. It had been a long time since the _Lost Light_ had suffered like this. The crew was hurting. The ship was hurting. Anger and fear had clung to him in the hallways as he had made his way to the med bay. They threatened to pierce the nonchalant armor he wore-

“Soundwave's a Decepticon through and through, Rodimus,” said Drift. His eyes flashed green. “He won't respond to heartfelt words.” Drift's hand trailed to his hip and gripped a sword hilt. “There's only one language he speaks.”

“We don't speak _that_ language here,” said Rodimus.

“I know, that's why I-” Drift took a step back. He closed his eyes. After a moment, his field settled. He took a deep breath. “I've been where he is. He won't listen. We've tried that. I told him what he should do when he arrived and he didn't do it.”

“So, what d-”

“The Decepticons were wrong. I joined for a reason but by the end, that reason had dissolved.”

“Yeah, but-”

“We have to find the reason _he_ joined. Crack him open with it. That's what I was trying to do.”

“Do you _really_ think the right time to 'crack him open' is just after he wakes up from a hard crash?”

“There's _never_ a right time for a Decepticon to have that conversation. He's a captive audience now, though. He's-” Drift took another deep breath. His eyes were vivid blue around the edges. “If I could do it, so can he. So _should_ he.”

“Yeah,” said Rodimus. He put his hand on Drift's shoulder and squeezed. “We'll help him through it.”

Drift frowned and stared at the floor. “And...”

“Yeah?” Rodimus pushed his field out with positivity, even though he wasn't really feeling it. His friend was hurting. The little tells were there- Drift's eyes flickering through colors, the slow spinning of the wheels in his shoulders. Plus the big tell of going for his sword. “And?”

“I'm mad that he got that far, that he hurt so many of our people before we even knew what was going on. He knew _just_ where to hit us. I'm angry that I wasn't able to stop it. I should've thought of that _sooner._ I should've _known.”_ Drift pressed his hands to his face, smearing his make-up. “Wing's teachings didn't hit me at first, either. I should've used more practical methods. I'm gonna go get some crystals-”

.:Rodimus, Drift. Come to my office:. Megatron's voice rang in both their helms. They glanced at each other.

“Guess the preliminary reports are ready,” said Rodimus, distaste plain in his field. “The crystals will have to wait.”

~~

Rodimus, Megatron, Ultra Magnus, and Drift sat around the table in Megatron's office. They all had smears of blood on their plating. For once, Rodimus was not fidgeting. He did not loudly snack from the bowl of stale cubes that comprised the table's permanent centerpiece. He did not look at the ceiling and make amusing images from the perfectly-aligned rivets. A mournful and angry feeling permeated the room. 

Ultra Magnus reset his vocalizer. “First and foremost, Ratchet has sent an update: 73 total crew members injured. The majority of them suffered light to medium severity wounds and are stable.” He touched the patches on his own helm in illustration. “24 are critically injured. Aside from the Scavengers, Ratchet says he is confident the critically injured will eventually regain full functionality.” 

“I was just in the med bay,” said Rodimus. “They'll pull through.”

“A team has been sent to harvest metal from the lower corridors. Once the metal specialists purify it, repairs will begin. Ratchet is at a loss for what to do with the Scavengers. They've been heavily sedated and returned to their columns, though the columns are empty. If we cannot find the missing 0001 energon soon, he will fill them with our current mix, although he doesn't know what that will do to their bodies. But... if they stabilize, it will prevent their sparks from going out.”

Drift bowed his head and spoke a short prayer.

“As for... Soundwave...” Ultra Magnus shuffled data pads. “He has been contained in what remains of the quarantine area of the med bay. Ratchet has cannibalized one of the exploratory force field suits to immobilize him. Soundwave is stable but unresponsive. I sent-”

“He's responsive,” said Rodimus. “We-” He glanced at Drift. It was probably best to leave Drift's interaction out of it. “I just talked to him.”

Drift lowered his eyes. Megatron sat up straighter. Ultra Magnus reset his vocalizer. 

“Sorry. Continue,” said Rodimus.

“I sent a team to investigate Soundwave's quarters and they found-” Ultra Magnus nudged a data pad across the table to Megatron and Rodimus “-a _nest._ A nasty thing. A command center only he can use. He's left no trace of his plans, certainly no written notes of any kind. Information has been downloaded into the desk. Mirage is in the process of decoding it. We're certain there was a Phase Two of his plan, which was aborted when he crashed. Either he needed to supply some kind of code to enact it, or... some other factor we don't know of. Blaster, Mirage, and Perceptor have been sweeping the _Lost Light's_ systems. Mirage says Soundwave's infectious coding is _very_ difficult to detect. Soundwave has circumvented Mirage's 2938-locutions and mimicked our native language perfectly.”

“He was barely here _three days,”_ said Drift. “Three days!”

Megatron and Rodimus bent over the data pad. Rodimus shook his head over and over, tanks churning. Megatron asked, “is there a third phase of his plan?”

“Ugh,” said Rodimus. “I didn't even think of that!”

“Unknown. Perhaps when Phase Two is understood, we can determine that.” Ultra Magnus nudged another data pad across the table. “There is also a room in the same hallway as Soundwave's command center, albeit not connected, which the team hasn't breached yet. Perceptor took energy readings and recommended great caution going forward. He's putting together a proposal for how to safely enter and investigate the room.”

Megatron flicked through the data pad. “All of the physical service lines leading into the room have been disconnected.”

“An isolated space,” said Drift. “Perhaps where he felt he could come up with his plans without any risk of detection?”

“We do not know,” said Ultra Magnus.

Rodimus looked at the data pads in disbelief. “How did he... _do_ all this?”

“Soundwaves are masters of communications. He's probably infiltrated our comms systems. Perhaps even our security system. That would explain a few anomalies we've identified in the camera footage from the past few days.” Ultra Magnus sat up straighter. “We are now at a unique crossroads of justice and mercy.” He looked at each of the others, one by one. “For the safety of the ship and everyone aboard, we must remove Soundwave from the reaches of the populace.”

Rodimus's spark hitched as he considered the implications. The mech _he_ had rescued and brought aboard had put everyone in danger. There was no way Soundwave could stay, but... “I get it, I totally get it. But what would we do? _Banish him_ in the next dimension? He'll die. He won't have an energy source anywhere off-ship. And we can't send him home.”

“Hence the crossroads,” said Ultra Magnus. “A fine balance between due punishment and metered mercy.”

Megatron muttered darkly, rubbing his arm. Blood had splashed there during the fight and pooled in the old connectors for his fusion cannon. He had been picking at it ever since.

“As the only person here who _has_ been banished,” began Drift. Rodimus looked away. “I must say, I am torn. My banishment was my choice and it was based on false pretenses. That is not the case here. But at least I had resources. I could eat the food I found. I don't think banishment is the morally correct thing to do, here.”

“Imprison him indefinitely,” said Megatron. He was doing a poor job of hiding the anger in his field. “The safety of the crew is paramount. His plan was premeditated. He sequestered mechs he had identified as integral for the _Lost Light's_ functioning. They were to be spared the onslaught, but the rest were intended to die. _Isolate_ him.”

“Isolation is what lead to this,” said Rodimus. “If someone- anyone- had bothered to talk to him-”

“I _did,”_ said Drift. “I told him exactly what choices like this would lead to. I told him his time aboard was an opportunity to divert his course. But he did not.”

“I told him in _no uncertain terms_ the Decepticon movement was disbanded,” growled Megatron. His eyes widened, almost imperceptibly, but Rodimus had learned to recognize the faint motion. “This invites a _new_ problem as well. If Soundwave no longer feels loyalty to _me,_ however misguided, then we do not know where his loyalties lie. 0001 Soundwave remained devoted to the Decepticon cause even after I left it. He tried to found a Decepticon homeworld in Earth's solar system. _This_ Soundwave is a _dangerous_ mech. You should have let me lock him up when he arrived, Rodimus.”

“You know that wouldn't have been right,” said Rodimus. His hands shook. He pushed them flat onto the table. “Look, no one feels this more deeply than I do. _I'm_ the one who brought him aboard. I should've stuck closer to him. He's crashed. He's gutted. Everything he knows is wrong. Now's the time to let him rebuild into something better!”

“Your empathy is commendable,” said Drift. “You've truly centered yourself.” His expression twisted with doubt. “But...”

 _“But?_ Is there a limit to empathy, Drift?” asked Rodimus. “That's not what you've always said.”

“Blind empathy is imprudent,” snapped Megatron. “One might rather think you are deferring your own guilt, Rodimus.”

“Hey! You of all people know we have a policy of peace and integration-”

“Making a policy based on idealized hypotheticals and then seeing that policy fail are two different things,” said Megatron. “Being flexible is a strength, here. We can change our policy at will to suit new situations.”

 _“That_ is an invitation to a long and arduous argument,” said Ultra Magnus. “Some rights are immutable. We selected ours. We can't adjust them every time the status quo is challenged.”

Rodimus cradled his head in his hands. “There were no fatalities. Except the fatal mistake Soundwave made trying to use the _Scavengers_ as weapons of mass destruction.” 

Drift's field flared with bitter amusement.

“Ironically, we would probably be in a _worse_ place if Soundwave had done what I actually told him to do,” said Megatron. “If he had _talked_ to the mechs aboard, he would have learned the Scavengers are no warriors.”

Ultra Magnus glanced at the report from Ratchet. “Although the Scavengers initiated the assault, they sustained more injuries than anyone else. Once they were contained, Nickel fired on every single one of them, and when Spinister couldn't punch the others to unconsciousness any _more,_ he started punching himself.”

Drift shook his head. “So many injured mechs and the med bay is completely smashed to pieces. It's going to take forever for Ratchet to clean it up. Swerve, Velocity, and Anode's experiments are destroyed. And the 0001 energon...” His finials dipped. “The temple to home...”

“I saw it,” said Rodimus softly. The sight of the smashed bottles of innermost energon had felt like a physical blow. Ambulon had gently pushed him out of the containment chamber, promising to take care of it. Rodimus was silently grateful for that- no 0001 mech should've had to bear the chore of sweeping up the splintered glass and broken flowers.

“He did that purposefully,” said Megatron. “He could have poisoned our food supply. Practical. Easy. But he chose to...” His frown twisted with distaste. “Before the... _incident,_ Soundwave came to my hab suite. He quoted _Towards Peace,_ a passage concerning the importance of symbols. I thought at first he was defending his use of the Decepticon symbol in a display of loyalty to me. But I think... I think he meant it figuratively. One can crush one's enemy if they reveal the contents of their spark. Ambulon had explained to him that the Scavengers and the 0001 energon were sacred to us. Our last tie to home. Soundwave deliberately targeted them to destroy that which we hold most dear.”

“Infiltration,” muttered Drift. His eyes flicked to Megatron and away again. “Devastation.”

Megatron's field went noticeably cold, then was hastily retracted. “Soundwave is too dangerous.”

Rodimus scoffed. “He's done less injury to the crew than _some_ of us on board have, in the past.”

“That's not a fair point,” said Ultra Magnus, glancing at Megatron. “That's not-”

“How so?” asked Rodimus. “We let Brainstorm come back. He _changed the timeline._ Like, _all of space and time._ And we let _him_ come back.”

“Respectfully,” growled Megatron. “Brainstorm has proven himself useful aboard.”

“Hey, we all know how dangerous the 'you're only worth having around if you're useful' stipulation is,” Rodimus shot back.

“Brainstorm had the good sense to only humiliate _himself,”_ spat Megatron. “How many hundreds of years will it take me to repair my good standing with the crew? Everyone witnessed Soundwave saying _I_ ordered him to orchestrate the attack!”

“Yeah! And then they all witnessed you deactivating him and helping the injured to the med bay! And don't think your tears were missed by anyone, either!”

“They weren't tears-”

“I saw the anguish in your aura,” said Drift. “I felt it in your field.” 

“This isn't about your ego, Megatron!” shouted Rodimus. 

“Of _all_ the mechs to _preach_ about _ego-”_

“Order!” Ultra Magnus banged his fist on the table. “Let's not get heated, here.”

“Everyone breathe deeply. Recenter yourselves,” said Drift. Rodimus and Megatron both shot him venomous looks. 

“If I am to remain impartial in this,” said Ultra Magnus, “which, despite the difficulty, I _do_ intend to be, I must relate to you that Brainstorm has written a, for lack of a better term, letter of recommendation for Soundwave.”

 _“What?”_ said Megatron.

“I shall summarize,” said Ultra Magnus. “He says the black liquid he scraped from the floor of the cafeteria is a form of energon we've never encountered before. It has the potential to be extremely energy-rich. I cannot understate his excitement in this regard. He underlined the words 'energy rich' three times. They were followed by 14.5 exclamation points.” Ultra Magnus shook his head. “The mech is a travesty to punctuation.”

Rodimus rolled his eyes.

“That said,” Ultra Magnus tucked his fist under his chin thoughtfully, “I would like to know where he's going with this. I believe a mech of Soundwave's talents would benefit the _Lost Light.”_

“He hasn't demonstrated an ability to _change,”_ said Megatron.

“I don't think we gave him the opportunity to,” said Rodimus. “I told Soundwave that he was getting a second chance here. But he was sequestered. He's been hungry. He's lonely and tired. I can't look at myself in the mirror and say, 'yup, Rodimus, you sure gave that mech a real second chance. Good job!'”

“I thought this wasn't about ego,” muttered Megatron.

“It's _not_ about ego when it's about _me,”_ said Rodimus.

Ultra Magnus snorted.

“We can't abandon him. We all know that's not right,” said Rodimus. “And I don't like the idea of hauling someone around in a seclusion chamber for the rest of our lives. We _have_ to integrate him. We have to _try_ this time. I know if we give him a chance, he'll do amazing things. Just like the rest of us have.”

“Velocity has already proposed a medical device she can install that would disrupt his ability to access our communication systems,” said Ultra Magnus. “I would be... _personally_ more amenable to his integration, were he to voluntarily take on the device.”

“Integration, if chosen, will be on _our_ terms, not his,” said Megatron.

“We could give _him_ the choice,” said Drift. “He could choose. If he would rather be isolated, maybe that would be for the best.”

Silence descended on the room. Megatron sat back with a frown, eyes distant. Ultra Magnus turned his head to the side, no doubt mentally scanning thousands of court cases and laws. Drift slouched forward just the tiniest bit, his field sad.

Finally, Ultra Magnus broke the silence. “I feel this is the fairest conclusion. We can determine a just punishment in the near future. Right now we should focus on having him dismantle his infiltration framework and expunge his plans.”

 _“Hrmm,”_ said Megatron.

Rodimus slapped the table. “Sounds good! Who's gonna ask him?” All three mechs looked at him. “Oh, no. Not me. You should do it, Megatron. You need to talk to him.”

“No,” said Megatron.

“He asked for you.”

Megatron scowled.

“He's _already done_ the bad thing you were worried about. And look at you. You're just fine! You're not exhibiting any genocidal tendencies, as far as I can see. You haven't even punched anyone!”

Megatron gave him a grim look and scratched at his arm.

“Er. Except for Soundwave, himself.”

“I think it would be a good idea,” said Ultra Magnus.

Drift nodded. “He still doesn't believe us. He needs closure. From you.”

Megatron sighed. “Is he damaged?”

“What, physically?” Rodimus put his hand over his spark. “I don't think that's where the damage is.” 

Megatron rubbed his forehead and groaned.

~~

In an attempt to understand and address its multiple problems, Soundwave's processor split itself in half. Then fourths. Then eighths. Each part struggled to grasp the enormity of what had happened. Three of the parts came together again. Another part split off. Soundwave darted from thought to wordless thought. Understandings weren't just in numerical data anymore. They had a depth now, an emotional undercurrent that continually swept him away. For seconds or years, he could not tell.

_emotion-suppressing protocols, corrupted-_

_megatron-_

_autobots. autobots??_

_**anger** _

_promise-_

_critical destabilization-_

“Soundwave, listen well.”

 _That_ voice catapulted Soundwave to wakefulness. His processor lined itself up in a hasty jumble. Soundwave onlined his visor.

Megatron sat beside him, hunched, his field awash with discomfort. His helm was tilted down, shadows cast over his eyes. “I apologize for striking you.”

_...apology??_

Soundwave _stared_ at Megatron. Emotions hammered through him: pain, helplessness, humiliation. This apology was something his spark had no idea what to do with. It seemed to spit light in all directions every time he _felt_ something. Laserbeak rustled against his chest. Out of habit, Soundwave summoned his emotion-suppressing protocols, but they were gone.

“I speak no duplicities now when I say that the Decepticons are disbanded,” continued Megatron firmly. “Violence is not tolerated here. The Decepticon ideals are _not_ practiced here. Do you understand?”

Soundwave's processor collapsed again.

_loyal-_

_superior-_

_why-_

“Answer me, Soundwave.”

“I hear you,” said Soundwave, scratchy and dissonant. He focused on Megatron's voice: its elemental pitches, underlying undulations and that one cycling, sonorous component that identified him as _Megatron._ Soundwave's processor clung to it, structuring itself around it like a snowflake crystalizing around its dusty nucleus. “I hear you. I do not understand.”

Megatron sighed. “You must obey the rules of this ship. There is _no other_ survivable recourse for you.”

The delicate snowflake melted away.

_obey-_

_decepticons, superior-_

**_reboot basic thought protocols-_ **

_Lost Light-_

Discordant again, Soundwave fastened himself to the idea of joining the _Lost Light_ properly. Anger pulsed through his field. “Unacceptable. I will return to my home dimension.”

“You cannot do that. You know you cannot do that.” Megatron waved around the room. “Your two options are to live peacefully with the mechs here or be imprisoned for life so you do not harm them.”

_imprisoned-_

_Laserbeak cresting over the canyon wall-_

_starless sky-_

Soundwave's processor dissolved into the sepia-toned landscape of the shadowzone. The thought of being sequestered away on the _Lost Light,_ like he had been there, made Soundwave's chest ache. The years and years of emptiness, unnoticed while he was living it, registered as unbearable loneliness now. He rejected the thought with his entire being. He would fight imprisonment with every weapon available to him, every fiber of his frame-

**_Freedom._ **

That word, whispered in Rodimus's voice. His processor clung to it. Like a frenzied beast, his mind built itself up from the idea. Protocols finished running. Thoughts returned in stable, orderly fashion. Angry red lines appeared on Soundwave's visor as he truly understood, for the first time, what Optimus Prime's favored word meant. He tried to push the realization away. “You are a Decepticon!” 

“No, I am not,” said Megatron. “But I haven't forgotten how to think like one. Perhaps you will feel a twisted sense of pride in that I thought of a third option for you.”

“I feel nothing!” Soundwave felt the lie vibrate in every atom of his being. He pushed it, pushed _all_ of it, but it pushed back harder.

“Oh, I doubt that very much,” said Megatron. “The third option is not the Autobot way.” 

“Then I will take it!”

“Are you sure? We would abandon you. Dump you out on whatever planet we find first in the next dimension and then hop away. You will be free to terrorize whoever you like there and we will leave you to it.”

Soundwave shuddered. His visor lit up with his fuel gauge. “I will die in any other dimension but my own.”

“Exactly,” said Megatron. “That would be the Decepticon way, after all, would it not? If you were strong enough to survive it, then you would be worthy of surviving. Are you proud of me, Soundwave? Are you happy that I reached this conclusion? Are the basic horrors of the Decepticon way not revealed to you?”

“But... but I have been loyal-”

“Yes, you _have,”_ said Megatron. “And I am entirely curious to see where your loyalty shall lie going forward. But you have not answered my questions.” He sat back and looked at Soundwave expectantly. 

“Traitor.”

Megatron sighed. “I suppose I should thank you. You made me face my greatest fear and I escaped _largely_ unscathed.”

“Decepticons: superior.”

“So you would be abandoned in the next dimension?”

Soundwave said nothing.

“No, you won't be, Soundwave. The truth is, abandonment would not be the Autobot way. And I am an Autobot. And so it is not my way.”

Soundwave's field pulsed with anger. Though he had spent a lifetime cataloging every word his Megatron had ever said, these words fell across his processor half-heard. Born of weakness, they were not the words of a superior warrior.

_and yet_

_he beat_

_you_

Soundwave's processor threatened to shatter again.

“Let's approach this from another angle, Soundwave. Ultimately your plan was undone because you had relied on the Scavengers to serve as loyal Decepticons. You didn't know a _thing_ about them, did you?”

The insult curled inside Soundwave. “The plan was undone because _you_ are a traitor! No plan could account for Megatron the- the- the-”

“Autobot?”

_“Yes.”_

“But I _told_ you that myself. _You_ did not listen. Soundwave, I didn't want you to infiltrate the comm system. I wanted you to talk _in person_ to the mechs that live here. They are your shipmates, now. Or will be, if you choose to integrate. _Peacefully_ integrate.”

The thought of living with _Autobots_ disgusted Soundwave. But what else could he do? Soundwave's processor fought itself, both accepting and rejecting Megatron's words. His spark lurched. Everything inside him scrabbled for a path that made sense.

_freedom..._

Freedom _on_ the _Lost Light?_ Or _from_ the _Lost Light?_

What he needed... was a _plan._

Soundwave's processor skipped around again. Conversational snippets from the past few days flitted by. Something he had heard once came to the forefront. “Is it true every dimension falls to the Autobots?”

“Yes, Soundwave. Every dimension where the war has ended, the Autobots won.”

“The outcome is still undetermined in some dimensions?”

“Correct. Mirage's, in fact. One of the very few where the war has not yet ended. His Megatron was- _is_ \- most unusually cruel.”

Soundwave's visor called up Perceptor's data for Mirage's dimension. Reticles jumped around, highlighting various numbers.

Megatron frowned. “If you are plotting how to get to Mirage's dimension so you can help his Megatron win the war, I _will_ throw you out the airlock.”

The data froze. It was replaced by a video of Megatron saying, _“I am an Autobot.”_

“Don't you _dare_ play that back to me. 2938-Megatron _tore his Soundwave apart_ with his bare hands.”

Soundwave twitched.

 _“Ripped_ his face off, pulled his brain out _slowly,_ and ate it. Then pulled his spark out and shoved it into Astrotrain's.”

“Designation Astrotrain: unknown.”

“The designation was the least important part!” Megatron waved a hand dismissively. “Do you really think _unfettered cruelty_ won't apply to you?”

“Decepticons: superior.”

Megatron scowled. “You are _unusually_ loyal. Why, Soundwave? _Why?”_

Soundwave said nothing.

Megatron's stare was invasive and unyielding. He scrutinized Soundwave's antennae, his blank visor, the segmentation of his plating where Laserbeak anchored itself. Megatron tilted his head and studied Soundwave's long limbs. “So very, _very_ loyal. Such loyalty undoubtably placed you in good favor with your Megatron, in high standing in the chain of command. And yet you have such thin plating. No battle armor.”

Soundwave's visor flashed with indignation.

Megatron tapped the console by the bed. The monitor lit up with a diagram of Soundwave's processor. “It might interest you to know that I spent several centuries training to become a medic. I can read this diagram.” He reset his vocalizer. “I'm going to make an assertion about your life, Soundwave. Correct me if I'm wrong. Your Megatron stripped you of your armor. He forced you, or at least, _forcefully suggested,_ you to install emotion-suppressing protocols. Your world shrank down to the height of the dark halls of a Decepticon base. For millions of years, you never strayed far from his side. You were always listening, but you yourself were the truly captive audience: an unwavering, finely-crafted tool with no way to escape your confines and no purpose other than serving at your Megatron's will.”

Soundwave bristled.

“Fast forward to now. Now you have _no_ orders. Certainly without armored plating, you have no chance to survive alone in a foreign dimension. With no emotions, you have no personality and no memories. You have _nothing left.”_

Soundwave's visor went dark.

“You are lost now. Aren't you?”

The well of sadness and anger deepened in Soundwave's chest.

“Your entire life's purpose has been to support the Decepticons and to obey my counterpart in your dimension. But that's all gone now.”

Soundwave said nothing.

“Well?”

 _“Yes, traitor!”_ spat Soundwave. “It is all gone! What am I now!”

“What, indeed?” Megatron shook his head. “You're very, very good at your tasks. We found your command center made of recharge stations and rubble. Impressive. Perceptor and Brainstorm tell me synthesizing the strange energon you did was no mean feat. These are indications of an amazing mind, Soundwave. One that is, nonetheless, terribly focused on the wrong thing.”

The words shook Soundwave to his core. A phantom pain flared in his spark. “My Megatron said the same thing, many years ago,” he hissed.

“No doubt just before _refocusing_ you.” Megatron glanced at the monitors floating above Soundwave. “Tell me, who _were_ you before your war? What did you do?”

Soundwave's visor flashed red.

“Do you even know?” Megatron leaned forward in his chair. “What else did he take from you?”

The arena dream thundered back into Soundwave's processor. His visor displayed bursts of data, discordant, words in his native cyphers, flashes of video. “He took my first, which I wrap around with my second and my third. He took the eyes and ears of my spark. He took the definition of _Soundwave.”_

Megatron stared at him thoughtfully. _“He took the definition of Soundwave..._ And then he stripped you down and rebuilt you to his liking?”

“Soundwave: superior!”

“Break and rebuild,” said Megatron softly. “A reliable method for producing monsters.”

Bitterly, Soundwave said, “broken: again.”

“Then rebuild: again,” said Megatron. “Into something better than a monster. It is possible. _If_ you do the work for it. I will not ask again. What will it be, Soundwave? Integration or incarceration?”

Soundwave couldn't bring himself to say it in his own voice. He played a clip of Rodimus on his visor. _“Freedom.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> feb 11 2021 update: ayyyy I really don't mean for there to be such big gaps between chapters. The next chapter is done but it's not _good_ yet. I'm still working on it. Never fear, this fic is extremely _not_ abandoned. It's just hard to figure out and I really want to give you the highest quality writing I can. For latest updates you can always check my twitter, @AltraViolet00 =)


End file.
